'Cotton cultivation area can be increased'

Dharwad, Karnataka, Apr 8 (UNI) There was scope for bringing in additional area under cotton cultivation in the North Eastern States of Assam, Tripura, Meghalaya and Mizoram if cotton cultivation was revived there by high-yielding arboreums and desi hybrids, Central Institute for Cotton Research (CICR) Director B M Khadi said today.

Delivering the key note address at a two-day annual group meeting of All India Coordinated Cotton Improvement Project at the University of Agricultural Sciences here, he said there was also scope for bringing an additional five lakh hectares under cotton cultivation in Jharkhand, Chattisgarh and Orissa, besides another one lakh hectares in Karnataka and Tamil Nadu.

Dr Khadi lamented that though India ranked first in area under cotton cultivation with about 20 per cent of the world cotton area, it came only third in terms of production, next to China and the USA with a global share of 12 per cent. While cotton area in India remained static since 1995 at around 85 lakh hectares, production and productivity had shown significant uptrend in the last decade.

He said the introduction of Bt cotton for commercial cultivation in 2002 in the country had seen a paradigm shift in research priorities. Initially, it was cultivated in 38,000 hectares, which was increased to 13.5 lakh hectares last year. By 2008, it was likely to reach around 20 to 25 lakh hectares, which would account for 80 per cent area under hybrid cotton.

''Bt cotton is now being cultivated in all the three cotton growing zones and cotton farmers have shown keen interest in adopting Bt technology. Hence, production and protection technologies of Bt cotton needs special impetus.'' Towards this goal, the All India Coordinated Cotton Improvement Project and the Nagpur-based CICR, in tandem with the private sector, should prioritise future research agenda to address emerging researchable issues, technology and its speedy dissemination, he said.

University Vice-Chancellor S A Patil, who inaugurated the meet, expressed concern over cotton industries showing less interest in assisting cotton research in the country and stressed the need to set up a cotton research centre to overcome the problem.

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