Alternatives to gypsum developed for better agriculture yield

Tribune News Service

Parveen Arora

Karnal, February 6

To address the problem of the non-availability of quality gypsum, scientists of the ICAR-Central Soil Salinity Research Institute (CSSRI) have developed alternatives to the mineral.

They have developed three categories of sulphur-based formulations, which are suitable for different soil sodicity and the presence of a high proportion of sodium ions .

As per scientists, at present, gypsum is supplied to Haryana and Punjab from Rajasthan, which is not meeting the minimum standard of 70 per cent purity set by the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS).

“The lower availability of quality gypsum for sodic soil (popularly known ausar/kallar soils) reclamation is a major challenge in productive utilisation of such lands. These alternatives developed by our scientists will reduce the dependency on the mining material,” said Dr PC Sharma, Director, ICAR-CSSRI.

“Our scientists — Dr Arvind Kumar Rai, Dr Nirmalendu Basak, Dr Parul Sundha, Dr Rameshwr Lal Meena, Dr Raj Mukhopdhyay and Dr RK Yadav — in collaboration with Reliance Industries Ltd, Mumbai, under the public-private partnership programme, took five years to develop these alternatives,” said the Director.

“These alternatives were evaluated in 83 locations in Punjab, Haryana, UP, MP, and Rajasthan. In fields with very lower sodicity, these showed eight per cent increase in yield and in highly sodic fields of wheat, rice, cotton, and berseem (fodder crop), around 225 per cent increase was witnessed,” said Dr Sharma.

These formulations are highly reactive and get oxidised within one crop season by soil microorganisms. These help in alleviating the stress developed due to excessive alkaline salts in soil, he said.

“Sodic soils occupied over 3.77 million hectares of India and this area is likely to be increased in cultivated irrigation commands of the country by 2030,” he said.

Principal scientist Dr Rai said the formulation developed by them had over 90 per cent purity, which is higher in comparison to mined gypsum.Besides, they have also developed flue-gas desulfurisation gypsum, another reclamation option, in collaboration with the National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC), Vindhyachal, Singrauli, he said.

These alternatives will ensure the circular economy of by-products from petroleum and thermal power plants,” he said.

“A study on the reclamation potential of these products has been completed and these are recommended for use in sodic soils. These materials will be made available with farmers as powerful reclamation agents this year,” said the Director.

Substandard mineral supplied from Rajasthan

• As per scientists, at present, gypsum is supplied to Haryana and Punjab from Rajasthan, which is not meeting the minimum standard of 70 per cent purity set by the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS)
• These formulations are highly reactive and get oxidised within one crop season by soil microorganisms. These help alleviating the stress developed due to excessive alkaline salts in soil

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