Stamping-out fake seeds racket

The Telangana police had busted an interstate spurious seed racket and seized huge stocks of cotton, paddy, maize, chilli and vegetable seeds which could have adversely affected around 40,000 acres of crops and more than one lakh farmers across Telangana in June this year.

Such cases involving the selling of fake/ spurious seeds have been on the rise in the last few years in many states such as Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra. This is because of a shortage of labs that can test the quality of seeds. The paltry sum imposed as penalty or fine, for such an act, is another contributor.

As per reports the penalty provisions for sale of spurious seed comes into play If any person contravenes any provisions of the Seeds Act/ Rules, on conviction be punishable: a) For the first offence with fine which may extend to Rs

500 and b) In the event of such person having been previously convicted of an offence under this section, with imprisonment for a term which may extend to six months, or with fine which may extend to Rs 1000, or with both. This needs to be amended so that the offender can be penalised with a fitting sum and/or jail term.

According to Napanta, an incubatee of Agribusiness and Innovation Platform International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-arid Tropics (AIP- ICRISAT), the country has about 138 seed testing labs in 33 states.

The agriculture ministry had announced plans of setting up 7000 seed testing labs in 2018 across the country in the coming years. But so far not much progress has been made on this. The government should act quickly to ensure that the farmers are able to buy the tested, quality seeds from approved agencies at affordable prices.

The traditional method of detecting seed defects typically relies on manual inspection, which is resource intensive and highly subjective. Hence, novel and innovative technologies need to be introduced in the market in seed testing and seed sampling to accurately assess the seed quality and provide crucial data.

Using the latest technologies available, Agdhi, a young startup from Bengaluru has launched an Artificial intelligence (Ai)-based technology to check the quality of seeds. Agdhi, by deploying photometry, radiometry and computer vision — offers efficient methods for seed classification and seed quality analysis.

The colour, texture, size, and shape are extracted from images of seeds, and the defects of the seed are identified through various classifiers based on computer vision. In a span of less than 24 months of its operations, the company has tested over one crore seeds in five countries with 100 deployments covering 12 different crops.

The agricultural sector is highly dependent on the availability and quality of seeds for a productive harvest. Therefore, in order to increase the quantity and quality of produce, efforts are made to introduce enhanced varieties of seeds with the help of advanced technology and modern agricultural methods. The

Federation of the Seed Industry of India (FSII) noted that the Indian seed industry is worth Rs 18,000 crore and is constantly growing.

According to the Department of Agriculture, Cooperation and Farmers Welfare, the country has about 540 private seed companies, including those of Indian origin and multinationals. Of this, about 80 companies have their own research and development projects. The rest produce and market the seed of public sector varieties and are not involved in breeder seed production. Most of the private seed companies are involved in the production of foundation and certified/ truthfully labelled seed.

To support the farmers, the National Seed Association of India and Federation of the Seed Industry of India should work with government agencies and technology companies such as

Agdhi to bring in new areas of technologies so that the farmers can enhance their produce and increase their income manifold.