Vegetos

Abstract

Lac is bio-degradable in nature and is being cultivated in large amount. Total production and export of lac in 2012–13 was 19, 577 and 4, 361 tons respectively. Major lac production in India comes from conventional host trees viz., palas (Butea monosperma), ber (Ziziphus mauritiana) and kusum (Schleichera oleosa). Flemingia semialata has emerged as one of the most suitable lac host plant. To demonstrate the profitability of winter season lac production on Flemingia semialata, field demonstrations were conducted in Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh, Odisha, Bihar and U.P. Broodlac inoculation was done at the mean rate of 50 g/bush during July-August and harvested in January-February and was found quite remunerative. The broodlac yield ratio varied from 1: 3.8 at Bokaro (Jharkhand) to 1: 9 at Patna (Bihar) with mean broodlac yield ratio of 1: 5.5. Lac cultivation resulted in higher net return of • 323929 compared to • 16980, • 26910 and • 43890 under rice, wheat and rice-wheat cropping system, respectively. The average B: C ratio of lac cultivation was 1.30 and that of rice, wheat and rice-wheat cropping system was 0.35, 0.81 and 0.54, respectively.