CONTENTS

1. Visit to a crop field to compare diseased plant with an

insect affected plant

2. Visit to a bakery unit and a local chakki.

3. Visit to a cold storage to record the storage of various

fruits and vegetables.

4. Visit to a mushroom production unit.

5. Visit to a nearby apiary.

6. Visit to vermicompost unit

Visit to a crop field to compare healthy plant
with an diseased & insect affected plant
Pest and diseases are part of ecosystem. In agricultural ecosystem farmers lose
an estimated average of 37% of their rice crop to pest and diseases every year.
Farmers can use different methods to control pests and diseases and cope up
with their effects on crops. Besides using pesticides and other chemical inputs,
many farmers use other more ecological methods such as creating physical
barriers or introducing natural enemies to their farms. It is important to note
that in addition to good crop management, with timely and accurate diagnosis
one can significantly reduce losses. There are various categories of pests and
diseases that infect paddy. Pests in paddy like Stem borers, Brown plant
hopper, Green leaf hoppers, Ear head bug, Yellow stem borer, Dark hade strip
borer, White stem borer, Ghandi, Rice plant hopper, Leaf folder, Rice Hispa,
Mole cricket, and Rodent cause a great damage. If we have a clear knowledge
regarding the pests and symptoms of attack we can get rid of it completely.

We the students of ONGC Public School went to a field trip on 07/04/2017. At

around 9:30 am we around 11 students along with our agriculture teacher
Mrs. Nandini Anandkumar and our Biology teacher Mrs. Rajalakshmi reached
the locale.

We went there to understand the difference between healthy plant and diseased
and insect infected plant in a easier way. The pest and their symptoms are stem
borer damage in which a hole was found on the surface of leaves. It affects the
growth ad tillering of crops. Brown plant hopper damage in which the crop
showed a burnt appearance. Tungro virus causes mottling young leaves with pale
green to whitish spots, stunted plants with poor panickles. In leaf folder damage,
the leaves were found rolled in the field, eggs and larvae were inside the folded
leaf blades with sickly and pale appearance of leaves, longitudinal white streaks
were on the leaf blade. Diseases like blast is caused because of panicle breaking
due to the weight of the grain, a black shaded region is seen above and below the
node. Shaded region is seen above and below the node. Ear head bug damage is a
damage in which tips of the leave appears yellow. The symtoms of stem rot is
small irregular black lesions at the water line on the leaf sheath and stem can be
seen. Sheath blight is a disease in which the leaf blade of the affected sheath
dries up from tip downwards and poorly filled grains can be seen.

I found it difficult to identify these pests and diseases in the field due to fewer
incidences. The farmer adapted management practices. As per the farmer, the
practices he adopted are:

Oil sprays Mixing neem and pungam oil in the ratio of 1:4 and spraying on
the field to control green leaf hopper.

Traps Yellow fly paper and pheromone traps.

Spraying 5% neem kernel extract to control leaf folder.

Placing neem cake bags in irrigation channel to control borer and using light
traps to catch the adults.
 Using pancha kavya.

Spraying plants organically underneath the with bacillus thuringiensis or BT

to kill the hatching worms. It is a naturally occurring bacterium found in the
soil.

By introducing parasitic nematodes.

CONCLUSION:

Once weve identified the troublemakers, we can control them with an

assortment of organic pest control methods like floating row covers,
pheromone traps, insecticidal soap, oil sprays,bacillus thuringiensis and
parasitic nematodes.

VISIT TO A BAKERY UNIT AND LOCAL CHAKKI MILL

The Indian food industry is poised for huge growth, increasing its contribution
to world food trade every year. In India, the food sector has emerged as a high
growth and high profit sector due to its immense potential for values addition,
particularly within the food processing industry. The Ministry of food
processing industries announced a scheme for Human Resource Development
[HRD] in the food processing sector. The HRD scheme is being implemented
through state government under the national mission on food processing.
 The scheme has the following four components:

1. Creation of infrastructure facilities for degree/diploma courses in food

processing sector
2. Entrepreneurship development program [EDP]
3. Food Processing Training Centre [FPTC]
4. Training at recognized institutions at state/national level.

On 09/06/2017 we about 15 of us along with our agriculture teacher Mrs.

Nandini Anandkumar visited a bakery unit named Iyengar located in karaikal to
observe the production of food items. We reached the locale around 10
.00am. It belongs to Mr Rakesh. He took us around his beautiful kitchen and
explained each and every processing. We saw various machines used for
baking cakes and its working. He discussed about various flavorings agents and
its standard mark. All the ingredients used for processing foods were certified
with FSSAI. He also mentioned the natural parts which it is extracted. He
showed us how to various moulds used for preparing for cookies in various
designs. The machine is given a particular coding or program which is typed
in computers and later injected into the machine with the help of chip. A single
machine can make infinite number of cookies by changing the moulds and
program which is given. Then he took us to the next section where sweets
were being prepared. The cooking was efficient; there was no waste of energy.
They used thermal fuel for cooking.

The pipelines were laid in a proper way. The pipelines were checked regularly to
avoid any leakage from them. The principle behind this concept is to avoid
wastage of energy. They used logs to produce heat. It was burnt under high
pressure in a big boiler.This machine costs 10 lakhs. This fuel is then transported
to various sections of the unit. They have an inlet and outlet valves for each unit.
In this method the heat is transported evenly in the vessel so that the taste of the
food will be good. Then later we saw the machine which was used to prepare
gulab jamun and rasgulla. Ladoos were prepared manually as well as machines.
Later we saw a machine which prepared nippats. Various sweets like kaju barfi,
ladoo, jalebi were prepared by them. Totally it was very useful for us. I learn many
things about bakery. I also understood the importance of food processing sector.
It is the backbone our society. India produced more raw materials but due to less
number of food processing sectors we are importing goods from other countries
at higher rates and exporting our valuable primary goods in cheaper rates. This
condition should be changed in near future.

LOCAL CHAKKI MARKET

Milling is a crucial step in post- production of rice. The basic objective of a rice
milling system is to remove the husk and the bran layers and produce an edible,
white rice kernel that is sufficiently milled and free of impurities.

On 14/07/2017 we visited a multistage rice mill belonging to Mr. Jagadesan

located in T R Pattinam to observe how rice was removed and packed. The
objective of mill is to reduce mechanical stresses and heat buildup in the grain.
Commercial milling systems mill the paddy in stages and hence called multistage
or multi-pass rice mills. Compared to sophisticated system configured to
maximize the process of producing well-milled whole grains.

The rice milling facility comes in various configurations and the milling
components vary in design and performance. A configuration refers to how the
components are sequenced. The flow diagram below shows a modern
commercial mill catering to the higher end market. It has three basic stages,,

1. The husking stage

2. The whitening-polishing stage and
3. The grading, blending and packing stage

Description of flow of materials and processes:

1. Paddy is dumped in the intake pit feeding the pre cleaner

A-straw, chaff and empty grains are removed

2. Pre- cleaned paddy moves to the rubber roll husker;

B-husk removed by the aspirator

3. Mixture of brown rice and unhusked paddy moves to the separator

4 Unhusked separated and returned to the rubber roll husker

5. Brown rice moves to the de-stoner

C- Small stones, muddy balls etc. removed by de-stoner

6-de-stoned, brown rice moves to the 1st stage [abrasive] Whitener

7-Partially milled rice moves to the 2nd stage [friction] whitener

D- Course [from 1st whitener] and fine [from 2nd whitener] bran removed from
the rice grain during the whitening process.

8- Milled rice moves to the sifter

E- Small broken brewers rice removed by the sifter.

9a-[for simple rice mill] ungraded milled rice moves to the bagging station

9b-[for more sophisticated mill] milled rice moves to the polisher

10- Polished rice, will move to length grader

11- Head rice moves to head rice bin

12- Broken rice moves to broken bin

13- Pre selected amount of head rice and broken moves to bagging station

14- Custom made blend of head rice and broken moves to bagging station

15- Bagged rice moves to the market.

They have signed many government projects too.

In ideal milling process this will result in the following fractions;

20% husk, 8-12% bran depending upon the milling degree and 68-72% milled
rice or white rice depending upon the variety. Total milled rice contains whole
 grains or head rice and broken. The byproducts in rice milling are rice hull, rice
germs .and bran layers and fine brokens.

It was really helpful for us. I learnt many things about the processing of paddy.

Visit to a cold storage to record the storage of

various fruits and vegetables

Cold storage is a special kind of room, the temperature of, which is kept very low
the help of machines and precision instruments.

Besides the role of stabilizing market prices and evenly distributing both on
demand basis and time basis, the cold storage industry renders other advantages
and benefits to both the farmers and the consumers. The farmers get opportunity
of producing cash crops to get remunerative prices. The consumers get the supply
of perishable commode ties with lower fluctuation of prices. Commercially apples,
potatoes, oranges are stored on large scale in cold storages. Other important
costly raw materials like dry fruits, chemicals, essences and processed foods like
fruit juice, pulp, concentrate dairy products, frozen meat, fish and egg are being
stored in cold storages to regulate marketing channels of these products.

There are three groups of products:

1. Foods that are alive at the time of storage, distribution and sale e.g.
fruits and vegetables.
 2. Foods that are no longer alive and have been processed in some form
e.g. meat and fish products
3. Commodities that benefit from storage at controlled temperature e.g.
beer, tobacco, khandsari,etc.

Temperature is the most important condition for storage of fruits and

vegetables. Products should be cooled as soon as possible to protect quality
and extend shelf life. Keeping fruits cool will slow down the ripening process.
Relative humidity is the second most important condition for storage of fruits
and vegetables.

Temperature and relative humidity

How can cold storage affect storage life?-Avacodas 3 weeks Mangoes 7 weeks-
Pineapple 4 weeks- Cabbage 3-4 weeks- Onion 4-8 months- Potatoes 12
months+. Using proper temperature and relative humidity, the shelf life of
fruits and vegetables can be extended.

Temperature maintained in cold chain storage may be divided into Refrigerated

and frozen catagories. Refrigerated temperatures are typically those above
0oc(32oF) and frozen temperatures are those lower than 0oc. Typically fresh meat,
poultry, seafood, milk, flowers, fruits and vegetables are held at 38 oF or 40 oc.
While some products such as strawberries, cucumbers and tomatoes are held at
higher temperatures due to sensitivity issues. Frozen storage temperatures
normally include two common categories.

18 oc(0 oF)and29 oc(-20 oF):

The later often referred to as ice cream temperature. Lower temperatures
may be specified for specific products such as sashmi grade tuna-62 oc(-80
o
F)but are not common. Temperatures used to freeze products are normally
lower than storage temperatures. Proper storage and warehousing is not only
integral to maintaining quality, but to increase prices for the producers and or
distributors and providing consumers the benefit of longer consumption
seasons.

At present there are two popular refrigerants in the market. One is Freon and
the other is ammonia. Ammonia and Freon compressors are being
manufactured indigenously. Ammonia refrigerant is cheaper, easily available
and is of high latent heat of evaporation but it has certain disadvantages like
being highly toxic in nature. It also forms explosive mixture when mixed with
oil containing high percentage of carbon. Rooms of different temperature
must be separated by insulation and should be protected from moisture.
Whenever possible, one coating of foam glass with vapor proof material shoud
be used against the outside wall. While fixing the insulation, the points to be
kept in mind are: (a) The surface to be insulated should be completely
moisture proof and be reasonably even, free of hump or hole plaster on the
walls. The ceilings must be cured before surface is insulated. (b) Precaution
may be taken to ensure that the moisture from outside cannot penetrate
through the wall, ceiling or floor.

The partition wall between two chambers should be insulated both sides.
Fruits and vegetables which are to be kept in cold storage are stored out and
the bad ones removed. The stored material is packed preferably in wooden/
plastic carton boxes and then are in the store

The Directorates of Agricultural Marketing and Inspection in state

Governments and Govt. of India are regulating cold storage industry under
cold storage order, 1980, ,promulgated under essential commodities Act, 1955
all over India except in the states of UP, Punjab, West Bengal and Haryana and
provisionally in Bihar state under their respective states under their respective
Acts/orders. The Ministry of Agriculture has now repealed the cold storage
order and advised the state governments also to repeat it totally. With the
repeal of this order, the cold storage industry will now be able to enter the
market free from all kinds of Administrative interference.

I learnt many things about the cold storage from this trip.