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Pest control partnership

A team effort between India and Oz is solving the problem of infestations in Indian grain

The development of a new project b y Indian and Australian sc ientists will hopefully save harvested grains from pest infestations, and improve the infrastructure of grai n production in India.

Mr Rajagopal A ikkara, ge ne ral ma nager of Food Corporation India, stated that India was the biggest exporter of rice and the third largest exporter of wheat in the world in 2013.

" ln India, every year about 60 million tonnes of these grains go into bag storage," said Aikkara. "Maintaining these stocks poses a big challenge".

In India and Australia grains a re harvested before s umm er and are scored in bags during the warm weather This invites pests and eventuaUy leads co spoil.age of these valuable resources.

The issue motivated the development of a strategic research alliance between Australian and lndian sc ientists, aimed at soh,ing this proble m ln 20 12, they successfully bid for a c o mpetitive grant from the Australia-India Strategic Research Fund and received $3 million. The grant will fw1d a project led b y Assoc iate Professor Gimme Walter of the U niversi ty of Queensland and Professor Chandrase karan Subramaniam of Tamil Nada Ag r iculmral U niversi ty (TNAU).

A team from India who are working on the project recemly visited the U niversity of Queensland's Brisbane campus, where Indian J...,i11k spoke to them and their Australian colleagues about the project and their partnersbip.

''Thi s project primarily focuses on the post harvest protection of grains by efficient handling and managing o f phosphine, a fumiga nt chemical used to treat pest in festations in grain," said Assoc ia te Professo r Walter.

According to Professor Subbarayalu Mobankumar of TNAU, in r ecent years insects have become resist,'lnt co phosphine, which is a fumigant that is too valuable to lose, as it leaves no res idu e, h as no adve rs e effects on the environment, and is cheap.

"We a re trying to understand the best method co deploy t:hi5 fumigant, w hich is accepted by markets worl dwide, to maintain its efficacy," remarked Mohankumar. ''Specifically, what methods s hould we use co destroy che insects without increasing their resistance levels".

"Grain handling in India also requires a boost in improving infrastrucmre from bag to bul k," added M r IC C hadda, g eneral manag er at the Central Warehousing Corporation. "All measures are being taken t o e n sure t hat cbe grains retain their quality as pe r global standards".

As co the progress of the project so far, Dr Pat Collins, deputy project manager, A u stralia, told Tndian Unk, " \Y/e have been looki n g at the in sects' biology and eco logy, smdyi n g their resi stance to phosphine and conducting practical trials at regul ar intervals. \Y/e have also been setting up re lationships between industry and science, which explains the presence of Nfr Chadda and M r Ra jagopal at our meeting in Brisbane O n e m ajor output from the pro ject is the first meeting this year of an Indian National Grairr Prote ction Alliance"

Tbe Indian team is hopeful that collabo ration between India and Australia will help improve the infrastructure of lndia's grain production.

In mrn, Australia receives Lhe benefit of India's experience in che area of phosphine resistance, as India has used p h osphine as a fumig ant for m uch longer than Australia.

"The alliance between al.I our institutions and the cor porations also means that we have a larger team with broader experien ce who are able to wo rk together to combat grain storage pests," said Assoc iate P rofesso r Walter.

The project is jointly funded by t:l1e Indian Department of Sc ience and Techno logy and t:l1e Australian Department of Industry. lt also brings together researche rs from the Queensland Department of Agriculrnre, Fi sheries and Forestry, the Indian Agricultural Research Instint re, the Indian Institute o f Crop Processing Techno logy and the Central Food Technological Research Instimce.

Fledgling organisation Overseas Friends of BJP has a dramatic debut year

work on the Friday nigbt, helped share the laddoo.r around, and afterwards, shook some boory!"

The OFBJlJ was formed in Ma rch last yea r.

Some 200 peop le gathered at Burwood Club on May 16 to watcb the elections results from India come in. They broke out in cheers every so often as the lotus bloomed and the Congress ,vilted (some even chanting the Har H,ir JWaha dev slogan), and passed the laddoos around.

They were assembl ed there at the behest of the fledgling organisation Overseas Friends of BJP (OFBJP), whicb organised similar events in Melbourne, Brisbane and Adelaide.

The message wem out via the organisation's Facebook page days before, asking people co join in for a "Vijai D iwas" (victory day).

\Vere they so sure of a victo r y?

"Yes, most definitely!" an exuberant Rahul Jetl1.i, convener of the OFBJP, cold I11dia11 Link. "I haJ been in India recently and had some assessment of the ground realities over tbere, and the general mood of the peop le".

Jethi was motivated b y a social media campaign started in the US but aimed at the lnclian populace, urging them tO come out in droves vote in the 2014 elections.

Amongst the people who arteoded were rnembers of the Liberal Friends of lndia, NSW :tvlember for Granville Tony Issa, Councillor Gurdip Singh, and the Hindu Council of Australia's Nihal Agar and Sanjeev Bhakri.

Yet Jetbi reveals thac ocher than these handful of comrmmity stalwarts, more than half tbe attendees were not even known to him.

"lt was transformational for us as an organisation coo, to see time we had reached out to so many regular folk," said Jetbi. "They \Vere people who believed tbat change is required in contemporary Ind ia, and who in some way, shape or form, support the BJP ideology. Tbey came after

"I've been a follower of the Bharati ya Jana ta Party since high sc hoo l," Jetb i revealed, "and bave been particularly motivated b)' the groundswell taking p lace recently seeking a change. Party headquarters in India gave the nod last year, and we had a soft launch in September with the ope11.ing of three chapters in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane".

\Vhen senior leader Venkiah Naidu was on a private visit here in December, they cook the oppo r tunity to make a formal laund1.

But the group has been active since early last year, witb monthly events such as Google hangouts with Narendta Modi, Subrahmaniam Swamy and Sushma Swaraj, and Chai pe Charcha sessions.

After the elections resul ts smnned the world, it's been nothing short of Modi ma11.i,1 for friends of BJP all over the world, as tl1ey rake to social media making much of incidents such as Mocli's b lessings from bis aged mum, his crazy cav alcade tl1rough the streets of Delhi, h is tl1ank-you visit to Varanas i where he prayed at the banks of tl1e Ganges, and his bo\Ving down in obeisance at tl1e steps of Parliament House. The utterances of the prime minister-elect, su ch as "l am a prime worker of the people," ate being touted as pearls of wisdom. MeanwbiJe tbe smart one-liners abom the dec imated Congress party (see box) continue on unabated.

Buoyed by tbe election resul ts, the OFBJ P are seeing a major role for tl1emselves at the commu11.ity level here, as we Uas in d1e mainstream Going forward, the organisation claims its agenda is to play a consa·uctive role enhancing tbe IndiaAustralia relationship

"\Vle are Australian citizens first, but ,vant to do our bi t to in crease people- to - people contact between ] ndia and Australia as well as trade and polity. To do this, we hope to be engaging with both sides of the political divide here in Australia" Jethi laments char the comm unity sentiment is not adequately represemed in the political are na.

"The exi sting organ isati.o n s stop shorr at being culmral organisations, w irh no political agenda. Our organisation has ver y definitive political aims We hope, for instance, ro take del ega ti ons to lndia to help achieve these aim s". r o doubt a visit by Prime :!vfinister Modi will be a major bighligbt. Prime l'vfinister Abbott has invited his Indian counterpart for the G -20 summi t io Brisbane later this year, and sbo uJd Modi take it up, it wilJ be a momentous trip not only for OFBJP b u t the Indian community at large.

Por more 011 OFBJP, visit w w w.ofojp.org.a u

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