Evaluation of arka microbial consortium technology in black pepper

Abstract

Arka Microbial Consortia (AMC) is an unique microbial technology released from ICAR-IIHR, Bengaluru for plant nutrition and health management in horticultural crops. It is a consortium of 3 unique bacterial strains viz. Bacillus, Pseudomonas and Azotobacter. This technology was introduced by ICAR-KVK, Gonikoppal in Kodagu district of Karnataka for addressing the problems faced by black pepper farmers of the district who were facing various problems like yellowing of leaves, spike dropping and death of vines due to a variety of factors like lack of nutrient uptake, nematodes, and Phytophthora infection. Farmers were applying different agro-chemicals to soils, thereby creating environmental hazards and increasing the cost of cultivation and still the vines were declining. The Microbial consortium technology was taken up as an on-farm trial and compared with 4 other treatments. It was found that drenching of pepper vines with AMC (@ 20g/l) three times in a year performed significantly better in terms of reduction in leaf yellowing, collar infection incidence, and wilting of vines. The pepper dry yield recorded with AMC application was 4.64q/ha which was higher than the other practices. The benefit cost ratio of 3.56 was higher than other practices. The technology gained popularity with the farmers and it is being followed by more than 2000 farmers of the district covering an area of 8000 ha. ICAR-KVK, Gonikoppal is annually producing 10–12 t of the AMC.