Farmers advised to use tunnel technique
Agriculture experts have advised the growers to keep temperature 18 to 24 degrees in tunnels for better growth of their crops as well as saving them from bad weather conditions.
A spokesman for the agriculture department said on Saturday that tunnel technology had been adopted by progressive farmers. The spokesman said that it is impossible for the growers to grow summer vegetables like cucumber, tomato, green chilies, pumpkin, sponge gourd, bitter gourd, vegetable marrow, red gourd, eggplant, watermelon and melon traditionally during the winter.
“However, the summer vegetables can be grown easily and successfully in low, walk-in and high tunnels”, he added.
He said that the tunnel-grown vegetables were covered by green fibre sheets to protect them from severe cold and frost during winter. “With the intensive care, the farmers can get early production of summer vegetables and earn more income than seasonal vegetables”, he added.
He recommended the vegetable growers to get proper training of tunnel farming first and then cultivate their crops in the tunnels so the farmers could get maximum profit with minimum input cost.
He said that fertile loamy soils having better drainage were best for the cultivation of summer vegetables in tunnels.
Published in The Express Tribune, November 28th, 2021.