One of the major constraints in increasing crop yields is the supply of nutrients. The main nutrient obviously is nitrogen. Taking into consideration ever increasing population of India in particular and the world in general, food requirements are ever increasing.

The exponential increase in the consumption of non-renewable resources for production of nitrogenous and phosphatic fertilisers are unaffordable for a country like ours. Entire potash is imported as not a single gramme of potash is found in the country.

Very high energy consumption, very high import bill (because of potassium), very high capital costs and very high pollution and environmental degradation are the four major curses chemical fertilisers are imparting to ourcrops.

Nevertheless, plants fed with chemical fertilisers will look lush, develop watery tissues and protein content of the grains will get drastically reduced.

An even nitrogen and phosphate production fulfills about 75 per cent of the country's needs and the rest is imported. Irony of the situation is in India, every year the rate of chemical increase is much higher than the rate of increase in crop productivity.

The farmer who is going to apply these chemical fertilisers by spending lot of money is facing a dual problem - 1) loss in productivity of crops and 2) loss in nutritional status of his land - tragedy either way.

Then what is the answer to this tragic scenario. Where do we go from here? How should we help farmer friends?

Well - answer to all these questions can be solved very efficiently, economically and environment friendly way.

Our farmer friends should utilise the environment friendly biofertilizers in different forms and packs, now widespread in the market. However, the questionarises' which is the right choice? Obviously the farmers should opt for a biofertiliser which will give them faster results and more benefits.

Of the several brands tested by Biotechnology Resource Centre, Mumbai in concurrence with Agricultural Universities and all India Horticultural Research Institute of Hissarghatta growmore biofertiliser introduced by Suvash Biogenics, Mumbai seems to be a better choice for several reasons.

Most of the biofertilisers available in the market are mono- functional meaning they will either add nitrogen or phosphorous. Growmore on the other hand not only enrich the soils with triplicate combination of cellulose degraders, nitrogen fixers and phosphate solubilisers but also with humus which is made from special red wrigglers' castings.

The analytical reports obtained by Biotechnology Resource Centre clearly show that Growmore biofertiliser is having 5,7 and 11 times higher nitrogen, phosphate and potassium contents in relation to normal fertile soil.

The main goal ofour farmers should be to achieve productivity, stability, equitability and sustainability. These are the four indicators of good performance in agricultural production, which can be certainly achieved by using growmore biofertiliser.

Growmore biofertiliser not only increases productivity, which is the main criteria followed alone for almost two decades, but also gives stability - resulting into constant agricultural production in spite of environmental and climatic fluctuations.

Equitability is brought about when there is assurance of constant agricultural production and it will be therefore shared equally between the farmers, members of a village and national population.

Last but not least the sustainability of environmental system will be maintained only if farmer friends move chemical to natural ways of farming using biofertilisers in their solid growmore form and liquid packs of shoot up forms.

Tropical soils of India are low in organic matter, organic carbon, moisture holding capacity, and threeessentials viz nitrogen phosphate and potash increasing bacteria. To restore all these factors, our farmer friends should use growmore biofertiliser, which has got major and micronutrients in balanced and available form.

These will restore adequate nutrient supply to plants, increasing organic matter, lowering salinity and alkalinity of soil bringing it to neutral (pH-6.8-7.2). In addition there will be increase in available nitrogen, phosphate and potassium in soil and its uptake by plants.

The micro-organisms populations have the capacity to convert about as high as 138 million tonnes of nitrogen every year into fertiliser nitrogen. It is thus possible to meet a large demand through proper husbandry of micro-organisms in the crop production systems.

The enrichment of growmore with efficient cellulose degrading, nitrogen fixing, phosphate solubilising and potash enriching bacteria is thus an additional benefit to our soil. Communicated pabulum for microbial activity is formed in the soil where theorganic matter gets constantly redistributed throughout its profile ensuring the rapid recycling and thus improving the overall soil metabolism.

Induction and thus enrichment of the quality of soil thus directly increases the crop yields. So, growmore not only gives healthy environment to the soil but also healthy nutrition to the root systems of the plants thus resulting into fantastic or startling yields.

Yet another advantage farmer friend will find in growmore is its non-perishable nature. Most of the other biofertilisers available in the market have limited shelf life of only 6 months. This is one of the major drawback of almost all the biofertilisers. Growmore becomes winning horse of a prolonged race because its shelf life is extended to five years.

Besides growmore can be applied in all parts of the country and in various seasons because of thermostable bacteria used while in its manufacturing process. This thermostability of Growmore helps its application in hot as well as coldtemperatures.

The extensive field trials taken by Biotechnology Resource Centre in association with agricultural and horticultural departments in different states have shown that sugarcane, grape, pomegranate and plants like eucalyptus and subabul give significantly higher yields after using growmore biofertiliser. In addition shelf life of all these fruits improved significantly.

Growmore was found to be excellent potting mix for green house and tissue cultured orchids and ornamentals. Application of Growmore reduced overall pesticide consumption by 85-90 per cent. This meant substantial savings of farmers on costs of chemical pesticides.

Another study compared yield increases in crops using growmore biofertiliser with crops ideally fertilised with chemical fertilisers, and found that the growmore gave an average of 22 per cent higher yields. The difference in yields (with growmore application) for various crops was as follows:-Chikoos (Sapotas) - 42 per cent; grasses - 30 per cent; eucalyptus andsubabul - 26 per cent; grapes - 22 per cent; roses and ornamentals - 18 per cent; sugarcane - 16 per cent; wheat - 17.5 per cent; tobacco - 33 per cent and tomato - 17.50 per cent.

Nevertheless, in relation to non-fertilised controlled plots the yields were minimum 2-2.5 times higher.

In fine, need of the hour for the farming community is to get the real balanced biofertiliser like growmore to get ecologically sound and economically beneficial crops.

Finally we like to end up this article by saying Mahatma Gandhi's quotes - The earth provides enough to satisfy every man's needs but not for every man's greed.

(The authors work with Biotechnology Resource Centre)