Chinnajalalapuram village

Narayana (right) has learnt fr Crop: groundnut
Agriculture scientists sometimes say it is the farmers' wives that make them spray pesticides unscrupulously. They should come here. "A farmer who had signed up for NPM with a women's group brought a bottle of chemical pesticide. The women seized and it threw it away," says V Kistappa of the Rural Integrated Development Society, the NGO helping the government's IKP programme implement NPM here. The greatest proponent of NPM here is a farmer who hasn't adopted it. "After nine years in the Central Reserve Police Force, I returned to do farming in my village, armed with the latest 'scientific' information that I'd picked up during my travels," says N V Narayana, 36. He takes three crops in his seven acres irrigated with a borewell. "I laughed when my brother Narsimhulu enrolled for NPM. He used neem powder and cow-dung urine on his four acres. I used pesticides worth Rs 20,000. I put in the best seed available in the market to his seeds saved from the previous harvest -- and I put them in greater concentrations. I was expecting a yield of 60 bags. I got only 30, making a loss of Rs 15,000. He got 50 bags and a profit of Rs 32,000. I feel like a fool," he says. "My cost of plant protection has come down from Rs 1,400 to Rs 600," says Narsimhulu. But groundnut doesn't have too many pests. Why has the response to NPM been the strongest in this groundnut district? "I've never got such good quality yield," says farmer C Prasad; better quality will get him a better price. His neighbour Ramesh Reddy used the same seeds, but used pesticides instead of NPM. His yield is lower and the quality of the nuts is poorer.