The present research study was conducted in the Anantapuramu and Chittoor districts of the Rayalaseema region of Andhra Pradesh state during the year 2020-2021 over a randomly drawn sample of 240 FPO members. The main objective of the study was to unearth the constraints faced by the FPO members and elicit their suggestions for the effective function of FPOs. The findings revealed that irregular supply of inputs to the FPO members (97.91%) was the major constraint faced by the majority of the FPO members followed by poor collective marketing of the produce (96.66%), absence of value addition and processing facility (95.41%), lack of credit facility (91.66%) and lack of coordination among members (90.83%) were the constraints expressed by FPO members. Regarding suggestions collective marketing of the produce (95.04%) followed by increased awareness about FPO among the FPO members (95.00%), credit facility to the members (93.33%), government support (89.59%), timely supply of inputs (87.50%) and information system should be improved (85.83%) were the suggestions expressed by the FPO members.

Berseem is a widely grown winter/rabi fodder crop in India. Thirty-eight weed species of 16 plant families were identified from different sites in India. Cichorium intybus is the dominant weed species, identified from almost all the sites. Whereas, Amaranthus viridis was positive indicator species for Rahuri; Chenopodium album negative indicator species for of Pantnagar and Ranchi; Anagallis arvensis positive indicator for Jhansi and Hissar sites. Weed infestation causes 25-50 per-cent yield (green fodder & seed) losses. Butachlor, trifluralin, fluchloralin, imazethapyr, oxyflourfen, and pendimethalin were used for the chemical control of weed flora in the berseem crop. Butachlor persists up to 100, Fluchloralin 243, Imazethapyr 90-240, Oxyflourfen 60-80, and Pendimethalin 60-200 days in soil. Butachlor has 5-24, Fluchloralin 12-46, Imazethapyr 57-71, Oxyflourfen 12-29 and Pendimethalin 55-77 days’ half-life. The application of herbicides influences soil environment by affecting soil flora and fauna. However, the chemical weed control method has environmental hazards, this is a widely accepted method due to its cost-effectiveness and timely control of weed flora. It also cut down the yield losses.

In India, where cereal-based meals make up the majority of the daily diet, bread wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) is a key grain crop. Micronutrient deficiencies are a result of the lack of a diverse food culture in the nation. Genotypes of bread wheat that have been biofortified might be introduced to address this. It is anticipated that more information on the genotype x year interaction of these nutrients in grain will help us better understand the size of this interaction and perhaps even identify more stable genotypes for this attribute. Year revealed divergent responses to grain iron and zinc. Compared to zinc, iron showed the lowest variation across the year. The maximum temperature was the major determinant for the four traits. Iron is also a significant correlation with zinc. Among the total fifty-two genotypes HP-06, HP-22, HP-24, HP-25, HP-33, HP-44, and HP-45 were found superior for Zinc and Iron content. This genotype with high levels of zinc and iron can be used in a hybridization programme to further crop improvement. Wide-scale cultivation of the chosen genotype with high zinc and iron content in the agro-climatic conditions of Jammu will work with the region’s current cropping systems.

The front – line demonstrations were conducted in 30 farmer fields during three consecutive year’s i.e 2019-2021 in Khammam district. In tomato cultivation pinworm was major pest especially during summer months. For management of  these pest the following IPM practices were  suggested to farmers i.e the installation of pheromone traps, collection and destruction of infested parts and spraying of Azadirachtin 10000 ppm 2-3 ml/lit 30 days after transplanting. Spraying of Emamectin Benzoate @ 0.4 g/ lit 10 days after first spray. Spraying of Rynaxpyr @ 0.3 ml/lit 10 days after the second spray was effective. The mean of the parameters in 30 demonstrations during three years (pooled) revealed that the percentage of leaf damage was 9.98% in demo field and 19.85 % in farmers’ practice. The percentage of fruit damage 13.21% in demonstrated plots whereas 22.57% in case of check plots. Average fruit weight was high in demo plots i.e 65.11 g when compared with check plots i.e 52.71 g. Higher marketable fruit yield  (60.08 t/ha) and 9.95 % yield increase were noted  in the demo field over farmers practice (54.67 t/ha) with a benefit -cost ratio of 2.68:1 and 2.23:1, respectively. It also observed that higher gross returns (430450/ha) and net returns (269552/ha) were recorded in the demo field than farmer’s practice (395250 /ha and 218336/ha, respectively). The technology gap and extension gap enumerated from this study ranged 10.93 t/ha to 18.88 t/ha and 4.12-6.74 t/ha respectively with the technology index of 19.89 % during an average of three consecutive years. The pinworm incidence was high during March. The results clearly showed that the positive impact of front-line demonstrations over farmer’s practices towards increasing productivity and reducing the cost of cultivation of tomatoes.

Heavy metals are the most important soil contaminants in the environment. Heavy metals are the integrated components of the biosphere and thus occur naturally in soils and plants. Heavy metals (Cd, Cr, Cu, Hg, Pb, and Zn) have occurred widely as a result of human, agricultural and industrial activities which is responsible for the contamination of soils. Some of these metals are micro-nutrients that are necessary for plant growth, such as Zn, Cu, Mn, Ni, and Co, while others have unknown biological functions, such as Cd and Pb. Agricultural activities involve the addition of inorganic fertilizers, insecticides, pesticides, and amendments to the soil for increasing productivity are responsible for soil contamination/pollution. Water used for irrigation and the release of industrial effluents in water resources pollute the soil with solid wastes, heavy metals, and several other organic and inorganic substances. Reclamation of such contaminated soils through the phytoremediation method was found to be the cheapest and an effective method for extraction or removal of pollutants from contaminated soils.

An on-farm trial entitled with Redgram as an alternate crop to cotton in rainfed light soils was conducted by KVK, Palem, Nagarkurnool district. During Kharif 2018-19 to 2020-21 three years to find out the best suitable crop in rainfed light soils of nagarkurnool district. Here the treatments are Redgram crop cultivation under demonstration and cotton crop cultivation as under farmers’ practice. The results proved that every aspect of the crop package Redgram showed lower costs and more returns and cotton have shown higher costs and lower returns. Package-wise results Redgram and cotton 3 years averages of costs are like Land preparation Rs. 6417 Rs. 8958, Seed cost Rs. 917, 5117, fertilizers Rs. 3875, 11854, inter cultivation Rs.5833, Rs.10833, Weed management Rs. 3333, Rs.5167, plant protection Rs. 6416, Rs.18996, Harvesting Rs. 5000, Rs.19333, yield 13.79q, 18.63q, Gross income Rs. 80349 Rs. 100944, cost of cultivation Rs. 33433 Rs. 80208, net income Rs. 46199, Rs. 22403, benefit-cost ratio Rs.5.94 Rs.3.19. Hence Redgram crop cultivation proved itself better when we compared it with cotton crop cultivation in rainfed light soils.

Aquaculture is considered an integral part of achieving food security and poverty reduction by providing nutritional, and livelihood security to millions of people around the world. However, poor health management and a lack of proper diagnostic facilities create problems in the early identification of pathogens leading to mass mortality in fish. However, fish, like any animal, are exposed to and susceptible to a wide range of diseases and parasites. Parasitic diseases of fish are usually encountered more often than microbial diseases. From 30%-50% of the cases received at several fish disease, diagnostic laboratories involve parasites. Some of the parasites could not be differentiated by conventional diagnostic methods from other phenotypically similar pathogens of the same genera. Some attempts have been made using biochemical tests, DNA homology, and protease variability. Moreover, most molecular technologies are mostly lab-based and need time to provide information on parasitic infections. Additionally, such technology couldn’t be used in the field, providing direct information on potential parasitic pathogens to adopt immediate management measures and avoid disease outbreaks and production loss. However, in the last fifteen years or so, great advances have taken place in understanding the molecular biology of fish pathogens and their hosts. Among them, vast fields of molecular study like Nucleic acid-based approach, PCR, ITS, RT-PCR, LAMP, Luminex, RAPD, AFLP, RFLP, and microsatellites have been used for parasitic disease diagnosis. Detection of nucleic acid molecules has demonstrated its usefulness for highlighting hardly cultivable, non-cultivable, and even dead microorganisms, generating appropriate novel or replacement technologies. Thus, a better understanding of molecular tools developed for the detection of specific parasites would be helpful to increase diagnostic precision, aid carrier detection, and promote species discoveries in different parasitic groups. Further, studies are still necessary to increase our knowledge about molecular tools in the detection of a diverse group of parasites associated with the disease in fish and also from fish to humans.

To enable farm people to increase their family food security, it is crucial to increase the extent to which diverse practises are adopted to combat climate change. The present study was undertaken to assess the extent of the adoption of different agricultural practices in rice crops in response to climate change. The study was conducted in the Jagatsinghpur district of Odisha . 2 blocks, 4 Gram panchayats, and 8 villages were chosen for the study 120 numbers of respondents by purposive sampling method. An ex-post facto research design was followed in this research. The findings of the study showed that giving protective irrigation in response to late monsoon with a mean score of 1.60 was the most adopted practice whereas resowing in case of low germination percentage with a mean score of 1.17 was the least adopted practice in the research area. Education, annual income, mass media exposure, extension contact, and farming experiences had a greater influence on the extent of adoption of practices in response to climate change. The conglomeration of education, annual income, mass media exposure, extension contact, and farming experiences of the farmers has attributed 75.3% to the extent of adoption of the practices.

An experiment was conducted to study the management of cigarette beetle by  exposing the adult cigarette beetles to different power levels of microwave radiation at 100, 200, 300, 400, 500 watts and different exposure periods of 30, 60 and 120 seconds  indicated that the power levels as well as exposure periods had a significant influence on adult mortality and increasing the exposure period from 30 seconds to 120 seconds and power levels from 100 to 500 watts drastically reduced the time required to cause the mortality of adults. The data revealed that exposure of L. serricorne adults to 500 and 400 power levels for 120 seconds exposure period was the best treatment which resulted in complete mortality of adults at one and four days after treatment respectively, also affected the fecundity and adult emergence of the cigarette beetle.

The key crop for the global economy, the chilli (Capsicum annuum L.), is badly affected by fruit rot, which can reduce yields by up to 50%. The most popular method for controlling anthracnose is the use of chemical fungicides. Based on pathogenicity studies, isolate Cc-3 was recorded as the highest virulent with early and late symptoms on chilli fruit among 19 different isolates. Isolate Cc -3 was used for the study of the management of Colletotrichum capsici by evaluating different fungicides using poisoned food technique. The efficacy of different fungicides viz., carbendazim 50 % WP, captan 50% WP, copper oxy chloride 50 % WP, difeniconazole 25 % EC, tebuconazole 25.9 % EC, azoxystrobin 23 % SC, azoxystrobin 11 % + tebuconazole 18.3 % w/w SC, carbendazim 12 % + mancozeb 63 % WP, carbendazim 12 % + flusilazole 12.5 % SE, prochloraz 24.4 % + tebuconazole 12.15 % w/w EW, tebuconazole 50 % + trifoxystrobin 25 % WG, metiram 55 % + pyraclostrobin 5 % WG, picoxystrobin + tricyclazole 20.33 % w/w SC, hexaconazole 5 % + captan 70 % WP were tested against Colletotrichum capsici pathogen collected from pinapaka village of Khammam area under in vitro conditions. The results from in vitro studies on the different fungicides tested, the EC50/ ED50 (µg ml^-1) values shown less in Tebuconazole 25.9 % EC (18) followed by difenoconazole 25 % EC (115), carbendazim 12 % + mancozeb 63 % WP (316), hexaconazole 5 % + captan 70 % WP (406), carbendazim 25 % + flusilazole 12.5 % SE (549), azoxystrobin 11 % + tebuconazole 18.3 % w/w SC (689) and prochloraz 24.4 % + tebuconazole 12.1 % w/w EW (762). Minimum Inhibitory Concentration (MIC) was recorded lowest in tebuconazole 25.9 % EC (100 µg ml^-1) followed by difenoconazole 25 % EC (250 µg ml^-1) and highest was recorded in azoxystrobin 23 % SC (3500 µg ml^-1) among all the six individual fungicides. Minimum Inhibitory Concentration (MIC) was recorded lowest in carbendazim 12 % + mancozeb 63 % WP (1000 µg ml^-1) followed by hexaconazole 5 % + captan 70 % WP (1250 µg ml^-1) and highest was recorded in tebuconazole 50 % + trifloxystobin 25 % WG (4000 µg ml^-1) among all eight combination fungicides.