The 72-year-old farmer is one of the directors of the company India s first owned by farm producers. Helpful expert advice came along: invest your land in a company, jointly owned by farmers and the Spices Board, for growing commercial crops such as turmeric, ginger and chilli and become a shareholder. Speaking at the function, he said the two companies were set up as producers companies under Section 581 of the Companies Act, 1956 for growing turmeric, ginger and chilli on a commercial...

But his biggest challenge these days is the glut of honey imported annually from countries such as China, Vietnam and Argentina, where it can be mass-produced faster and cheaper than Grose could ever dream of doing in this rural, southwestern Oklahoma community of 840. The bee colonies in his commercial honey operation have weathered fire ants, drought, mites, aggressive Africanized bees and a host of diseases, including one that inexplicably wipes out entire colonies. But his biggest...

Erma granted approval on May 28 for a trial in Canterbury to assess the performance of four genetically engineered vegetable and forage brassicas. Many of the submitters (against the trial) identified some real concerns. It alleges Erma failed to sufficiently address the potential for adverse effects, did not provide specific details on its trial, and misled the authority over the trial size and the existence of previous similar trials. Bleakley said there were alternatives to legal action...

The beetle can feed on a wide range of plant materials, including perennial plants, flowers, vegetables and field crops. This year we received a call from a crop consultant in Elkhart County that was seeing a lot of grub damage in sandy soil of irrigated first-year corn, said Christian Krupke, Purdue Extension field crops entomologist. The grub lives underground and feeds on roots, while the adult feeds on plant foliage. The fact that the field had previously been soybeans means the adult...

Paul Another week of above normal temperatures last week helped the rapid maturation of small grain crops, according to the weekly crop report from the Minnesota field office of the U. Along other crops, spring wheat acreage was 93 percent jointed, with 46 percent headed, compared to the average of 72 percent jointed and 31 percent headed. The condition of most crops fell slightly from a week ago, although nearly all the areas of the state received some rain during the week. The report,...

coli last year, touched off renewed debate about food safety when investigators linked the illnesses to peanut butter made at a ConAgra Foods inc. plant in Georgia. The CDC said the rate of new infections has tapered off and it urged people to immediately discard any remaining jars of Peter Pan or Great Value peanut butter with a product code beginning with 2111. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention had linked 288 cases of food-borne illness in 39 states to peanut butter consumption....