Family helps to perserve biodiversity in India's crops
Dr Prabhakar Rao and his family run a 2.5 acre natural farm in Bengaluru, wherein they grow vegetables that are indigenous and native to India and yet are not grown or found anywhere in the country any more.
Collecting exotic seeds from all over India
Dr Rao, who holds a PhD in plant breeding and genetics, has spent his entire professional career practicing architecture all over the world. While travelling, he collected 560 native indigenous seeds of endangered vegetable species from the oldest generation of farmers.
He kept collecting the varieties and started testing them for their genetic stability and climatic adaptiveness for the Indian conditions and eventually was able to sustain 140 varieties of hyper-exotic vegetables.
"Unbeknownst to us, we are every year losing hundreds and hundreds of native vegetable seeds in India," he laments about the dire ecological conditions of the country that are not easily noticed by urbanites.
The family believes that this is the way farming should be done, and farmers should be able to produce their own seeds from the previous crop, and use them season after season instead of buying genetically modified seeds every season.
Farmers get to grow these hyper-exotic vegetables, which sell at a higher market rate, and therefore, get a better revenue steam and a low input cost."
He wants people to use his seeds and share them with their friends so that these exotic vegetables don't go extinct.
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