eChapters

Part I - Preliminary

1. Short title: These rules may be called the Seeds Rules, 1968
2. Definitions: In these rules, unless the contest otherwise requires.

An Act to provide for regulating the quality of certain seeds for sale, and for matters connected therewith. It enacted by Parliament in the Seventeenth Year of the Republic of India.

1. Short Title, Extent and Commencement

• This Act may be called the Seeds Act, 1966.
• It extends to the whole of India.
• It shall come into force on such date as the Central Government may, by notification in the Official Gazette, appoint, and different dates may be appointed for different provisions of this Act, and for different States or for different areas thereof.

History and development of seed Industry in India can be discussed under two heads

1. Pre-independence development.
2. Post-independence development.

Nature has bestowed our country with diverse agro climatic and topographic conditions ranging from temperate to humid and from sea bed to snow line. The existing climatic conditions with a plenty of sunshine, nutrient rich soil, abundant water resources and reservoir of trained manpower, enable our country to grow various types of vegetables in tropical, subtropical, temperate, alpine and desert vegetation zones in one or the other seasons during the year.

Vegetables, the cheapest and nutrient-rich food source within the economic reach of poor man, play a vital role in human diet since they provide carbohydrates, protein, fat, minerals, vitamins, fibers and phytochemicals (non-nutrient bioactive compounds), which are essential for making the body immune system strong, detoxifying carcinogens, reducing muscular degeneration and protecting the body from infectious ailments. Vegetables besides having medicinal values also play an important role in nutritional security and national economy of the country since they are quick growing and short duration, and their yield per unit area per unit time is 5-10 times higher than the cereal crops.

Computer played a distinctive role in the growth of most advanced, precise and highly sensitive instruments especially in medical and analytical instrumentation technology. Due to the development of different kinds of software the instrumentation analysis has become easy, rapid and result oriented. Auto sampling, development of new methods for detection analysis and the validity of new developed method have been possible with no trouble. Once the standardization of method is over and saved, it can be applied at any time to integrate the unknown samples and their data calculation. Thus, it avoids repetition in calculation and the end result is time saving technique due to the development of computer-organized system in analysis.

The results produced are more reliable and reproducible through various computer based instruments e.g. scanning machines, blood analyzer, gas chromatography (GC), amino acid analyzer (AAA), atomic absorption spectrophotometer (AAS) and high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) etc.

HPLC is a technology or a system that works on the basis of software. There have been many definitions of computer shielded HPLC, such as high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), high-pressure liquid chromatography (HPLC), high-speed liquid chromatography (HSLC), high efficiency liquid chromatography (HELC), and simply liquid chromatography (LC).

Chromatography was first employed by Ramsay (1905) to separate mixtures of gases and vapours. The first scientist to recognize chromatography as an efficient method of separation was the Russian botanist Tswett (1906), who demonstrated that, when a plant extract was carried by petroleum ether through a column consisting of a glass tube packed with calcium carbonate powder, a number of dyes were separated, as shown in Figure 1. He named this analysis method “Chromatographie” after “chroma” and “graphos”, which are Greek words meaning “color” and “to draw,” respectively.

Need of Analysis Technique

There are various methods to determine the concentration of a substance present in the matrix of an organic matter, these methods are very expensive, require expertise, need skilled man power, expensive chemicals and sophisticated equipments. But the volumetric analysis requires very less equipment and its level of accuracy is fairly high. It is very beneficial in the preparation of normal and molar solutions which is the back bone of all the research. Scientific venture is useless without the preparation of accurate standard solutions which is to be used in the estimation of various substances by sophisticated techniques like colorimetry, spectrophotometry, atomic absorption spectrophotometer (AAS), inductively coupled plasma emission spectrophotometer (ICP) etc. So the emphasis has been laid on the preparation of quick and accurate preparation of the standards. Volumetric analysis is the simplest technique by which, we can determine the concentration of a substance in solution form by titration of unknown solution against a known concentration solution. One solution is called the standard (known concentration) and other is called unknown solution. In this, reaction takes place either

The noun vegetable means an edible plant or part of a plant, but usually excludes seeds and most sweet fruits. This typically means the leaf, stem, or root of a plant. Vegetables are eaten in a variety of ways, as part of main meals and as snacks. The nutritional content of vegetables varies considerably, though generally they contain little protein or fat (Woodruff,1995 and Whitaker, 2001) and varying proportions of vitamins such as Vitamin A, Vitamin K and Vitamin B6, provitamins, dietary minerals and carbohydrates. They contain a great variety of other phytochemicals, some of which have been claimed to have antioxidant, antibacterial, antifungal, antiviral and anticarcinogenic properties (Gruda, 2005; Steinmetz and Potter,1996). Some vegetables also contain fiber, important for gastrointestinal function. Some contain important nutrients necessary for healthy hair and skin as well. However, vegetables often also contain toxins and antinutrients such as á-solanine, á-chaconine,(Science direct) enzyme inhibitors (of cholinesterase, protease, amylase, etc.), cyanide and cyanide precursors, oxalic acid, and more (Bad Bug Bock > BBB–Clostridium botulinum). Depending on the concentration, such compounds may reduce the edibility, nutritional value, and health benefits of dietary vegetables. Cooking and/or other processing may be necessary to eliminate or reduce them. Diets containing recommended amounts of fruits and vegetables may help to lower the risk of heart diseases and two type of diabetes. These diets may also protect against some cancers and decrease bone loss. The potassium provided by vegetables may help to prevent the formation of kidney stones.

Spices are defined as “A strongly flavored or aromatic substance of vegetable origin, obtained from tropical plants, commonly used as a condiment”. American Spice Trade Association (ASTA) defines spices as “Any dried plant product used primarily for seasoning purposes”. The word “spice” came from the Latin word “species,” meaning specific kind. The name reflects the fact that all plant parts have been cultivated for their aromatic fragrant, pungent or any other desirable properties including the seed (aniseed, caraway, coriander), leaf (cilantro, kari, bay, mint), berry (allspice, juniper, black pepper), bark (cinnamon), kernel (nutmeg), aril (mace), stem (chives), stalk (lemongrass), rhizome (ginger, turmeric, galangal), root (lovage, horse radish), flower (saffron), bulb (garlic, onion), fruit (star anise, cardamom, chile pepper) and flower bud (clove). Spices are distinguished from herbs, which are leafy, green plant parts used for flavoring purpose. Herbs, such as a basil or orengano, may be used fresh and are commonly chopped in to smaller pieces; spices however are dried and usually ground in to a powder (Anonymous, 2007).

In ancient times, spices were as precious as gold, and as significant as medicines, preservatives and perfumes. India is known as the home of spices and produces a wide variety of spices like black pepper, cardamom (small and large), ginger, garlic, turmeric, chilli and a large variety of tree and seed spices. These have nutritionally insignificant quantities as a food additive for the purpose of flavoring. They are good not only for our taste buds but also for our health. They have medicinal properties and also used as preservatives. Spices are well known appetizers, digestives and considered essential in culinary art all over the world. Some of them have antioxidant properties, while others possess strong antimicrobial and antibiotic activities. Spices increase the secretion of saliva rich in ptyalin, which facilitates starch digestion in the stomach, rendering the meals, which are rich in carbohydrates, more digestible. They inhibit thrombus formation and accelerate thromobolysis (Anonymous, 2007a).

India is the world’s second largest producer of fruits, of which mango, banana, citrus, guava, grape, pineapple and apple are the major ones. Apart from these, fruits like papaya, sapota, aonla, phalsa, jackfruit, ber, pomegranate in tropical and sub-tropical parts and peach, pear, almond, walnut, apricot and strawberry in the temperate parts are also grown in a sizeable area. Date palm and fig cultivation is also finding favour in some areas. The major fruit growing states are Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Gujarat.

Production of fruits in India is 44.04 million tones from an area of 3.72 million hectares. One of the bottlenecks in fruit production is the losses incurred by insect pest and diseases which necessitated the use of pesticides to curb the pest problem. Use of pesticides in India is very low 0.350–0.5 kg/hectare as compared to 7.0 kg/hectare in USA, 2.5 kg/hectare in Europe, 12 kg/hectare in Japan and 6.6 kg/hectare in Korea. Despite of low pesticide consumption in India, there is a great problem of pesticide residues vis-a-vis other countries and these residues have entered into food products and underground water because of non-prescribed use of chemical pesticides, wrong advice and supply of pesticides to farmers by vested interests, non-observance of prescribed waiting period, pre-marketing pesticide treatments during storage and transport, use of sub-standard pesticides, effluents from pesticide manufacturing units, continued use of persistent pesticides for public health programme, lack of awareness and lack of aggressive educational programmes for farmers/consumers.

Plant pathogens are known to cause yield reduction of almost 20 per cent in the principal food and cash crops worldwide (Oorke et al., 1994). These losses may be more severe when highly susceptible cultivars are widely grown in a particular region of the globe. The increased world’s population is posing a major global challenge to provide sufficient quatity of food with high quality fruits and vegetables. Nearly, 570 million US $ is now spent annually on research and development by the leading 15 agricultural Companies to combat with the important diseases of major food, fruits and vegetable crops. There are more than 150 active ingredients registered as fungicides worldwide (Mc Dougal, 1996). In the present era of intensive agriculture, fungicides play an important role in our fight against plant diseases and reduce the losses in yield and quality of farm produce. The global fungicide sale has been estimated to be $ 6.0 billion US. The cereal and vine industries of the Western European have become largest fungicide market followed by North America. However, the fungicide use is not intensive in Asia and the new world.

This article presents the historical development of fungicides, mode of their action, development of resistance to fungicides, fungicidal residue and chemical control of various diseases of horticultural and plantation crops.

1. INTRODUCTION

Chemical pesticides are designed to control or eliminate pests such as insects, rodents, weeds, bacteria, and fungus. Although pesticides have played a significant role in increasing food production and controlling various diseases in the agriculture system but indiscriminate use of pesticides has resulted in contamination of soil, water bodies’ etc. raising deep concern about food safety and human health. Excessive use of these harmful chemicals affects kidneys, developing fetus, and liver immuno-suppression and increased incidence of breast cancer. Some of these pesticides are also reported as mutagenic. Other health related problems such as impaired memory and concentration, severe depression, headache, etc have also been reported.

Through field survey (Kadian et al., 2010) it has been found that chlorpyrifos is a widely used pesticide in household application as well as in horticulture crop in National capital region Delhi. This tempted us to understand the nature of chlorpyrifos (CPF) and its metabolites and assess the suitability of available techniques for detoxification of contaminated soil.

The availability of wide range of pesticides though has been responsible for increasing crop production through regulating arthropod (insect and mite) pest populations in agricultural and horticultural crop production systems but unfortunately, improper and excessive use of pesticides has resulted into a number of potential ecological problems including pest resistance, resurgence, residues in food, feed and fodder, environmental contamination, direct hazards to the users and mainly destruction of beneficial organisms including natural enemies. The most important group of natural enemies is entomophagous insects i.e. insect predators and parasites. Predatory insects are usually much larger than their prey and are generally voracious feeders that kill and eat a wide variety of insects as they grow and reproduce. Many predators are active in both their immature as well as adult stage. Insect parasites/ parasitoids are often tiny, non-stinging wasps. Parasitic wasps are free-living in the adult stage, but in the larval stage are parasitic on specific insects. The parasitic larvae eat their hosts from within, ultimately resulting in the death of the host insect. The compatibility of natural enemies with pesticides is essential as both these management strategies are important part of Integrated Pest Management programs designed to regulate arthropod pest populations and minimize plant damage.

The food plants of world are damaged by more than 10,000 species of insects, 30,000 species of weeds, 1,00,000 diseases (caused by fungi, bacteria, viruses and other microorganisms and 1000 species of nematodes (Hall, 1995). The global losses due to various categories of pests vary with the crop, geographic location and weather. Total yield losses from different pests to all the crops have been estimated to be US$ 500 billion worldwide (Oerke et al., 1994). In India, the current losses due to insect pests in principal field crops have been estimated to be Rs. 6, 89,400 million (Dhaliwal et al., 2004). In addition, there is loss of Rs. 60,000 million due to insect pests during storage. Thus, total losses to major crops and food grains in storage caused by insect pests are estimated to be Rs. 750 billion annually (Dhaliwal and Arora, 2006). Among regions, losses in Asia and Africa almost reaches 50 percent whereas in Europe (28.2%), North America (31.2%) and Oceania (36.2%) are below average. Losses due to animal pests in Asia (18.7%) are almost double those in developed countries and losses from weed competition in Africa and Asia are approximately double than those in Europe (Oerke et al., 1994). To combat such heavy losses mostly chemical pesticides are used by the farmers but indiscriminate use of pesticides has led to severe ecological consequences like destruction of natural enemy fauna, effect on non target organisms, residues in consumable products including packed pure and mineral water and ultimately resistance to the pesticides, to which we solely rely. Insecticides are always required to suppress rapidly expanding insect pest populations. Strategies should be employed to increase efficiency and accelerate insect mortality by combining microbials with sub lethal doses of chemical insecticides and botanicals. Biointensive pest management (BIPM) is the recent trend in Indian farming and attracting the farmers for higher income to their produce. This has resulted due to increased awareness among the end users and concerns about the deteriorating ecological situations among the eco-campaigners.

Microbial pesticides consist of disease causing microorganisms, which are disseminated in the pest populations in large quantities in a manner similar to application of chemical pesticides. It includes bacteria, viruses, fungi, nematodes and some protozoans. Pathogens may exert controlling effect by means of their invasive properties, toxins, enzymes and other substances (Lewis, 2006). The use of microbial insecticide has been proved to be a viable alternative to chemical insecticides, especially in management of forest insect pests. The combination of particular active ingredients and their ability of replication in host populations in the fields define the major differences between microbial insecticides and chemical insecticides. These differences have practical implications for their use in insect pest management programmes.

The modern improved crop varieties are responsive to fertilizers and demand higher fertilizer application rates to sustain high grain yields. With higher fertilizer inputs, the pest problems have become prominent and endangered the yields necessitating the large scale use of agrochemicals. Some of these chemicals are purposefully released or they may be accidentally released into the environment as waste water or residues from industrial manufacturing and processing of fields.

Soil is one of the most dynamic sites of biological interactions in nature, serving as a growth medium for vegetation and as a habitat for microorganisms and thus has a major role in determining the overall quality of our environment. The physicochemical properties of soil strongly influence the growth, activities and population dynamics of microorganisms in soil and also modify the effects of chemicals on the microbial community. Microorganisms are scavengers in soil. Due to physiological variability, they degrade a variety of chemical substances including insecticides, fungicides and herbicides in soil to derive energy and other nutrients for their growth and metabolism (El- Shahaat et al., 1987; Bhuyan et al., 1993). As a result, the population density of the active microorganisms increases which favorably influences the biological transformation of nutrient elements in the soil (Rangaswamy and Venkateswarlu, 1993; Jana et al., 1998). On the other hand, there are many pesticides which exert adverse effect on growth of soil microorganisms (Martinez-Toledo et al., 1992). However, no definite conclusions can be made on the effects of different pesticides on the growth and activities of microorganisms in soil since different groups of insecticides exhibit manifold variations in toxicity. The degree to which a pesticide affects microbial population and their activities is largely dependent upon the chemical, its dosage and the particular physicochemical parameters of the environment such as soil type, temperature, water content, pH, method of application and other factors. Soil physicochemical factors are particularly important and probably account for the variations in toxic effects often seen with the same compound. Some of the soil microorganisms and soil microbial processes appear to be more sensitive to pesticides than the others. For example nitrification appears to be highly sensitive whereas N-mineralization is relatively resistant. These results reflect the diversity of microorganisms mediating these processes. The present effort has been made to review briefly the effects of pesticides on microorganisms and their activities.

Rodents are well recognized pests and are considered the number one enemy of man. These animals, though considered primitive, have been so successful and abundant worldwide that they alone account for more than half of the known mammalian fauna. They can subsist on a variety of food and even without water for a long time. Due to their prowess of adaptability, they have successfully adapted to varied ecological and physiological niches, and therefore are inhabitants of practically each and every latitude and altitude. They multiply at super fast speed because they become sexually mature when they are just 6-8 months old. They then pose a challenge to man in all respects. According to Prakash (1988) in India there are 135 species and about 300 sub-species of rodents belonging to 46 genera. At least 15 of these rodent species are known to be the serious pest of public health hazard (Jain and Tripathi, 1988). Rodents not only damage the crops in the fields, where the infestation occurs at all stages of food production, processing, storage and distribution, they are also responsible for a number of diseases in the human beings.

Rodents attack the-crops shortly after sowing, during the vegetative growth and during the ripening of the seed heads. They damage the various crops of the kharif season viz., jowar, maize, ground nut and cotton as well as the crops of the rabi season viz., wheat and barley etc. They damage other crops also which include paddy, sugarcane, soyabean and Bengal gram etc. Hence some well planned rodent management is the need of the time and before going for the planning of any control method in a given situation it is essential to have an estimation of the population and the species involved.

Fruits are very important in human diet, as they are chief sources of vitamins and micronutrients. Variable agro-climatic condition in India provides tremendous scope for cultivation of fruit crops. Among fruits, apple, pear, cherry, plum, peach, apricot, walnut and almond (temperate fruits); mango, grapes, banana, citrus, pineapple (tropical and subtropical fruits); pomegranate (arid zone fruit) are important fruit grown in India. Insect-pests are amongst one of the major constraint for the low productivity of fruit crops in India. Therefore, it is important to have some information of the important insect-pests of fruit tree and their management. Over 1000 species of insects found damaging fruit trees all over the world, of these as many as 800 insect species have been intercepted from India (Butani, 1979). The information on insect pests of apple and other temperate fruits in India have been reviewed by several workers (Pruthi and Batra, 1960; Butani, 1979; Bhalla and Gupta, 1993; Sharma and Thakur, 1996). In India, more than 200 insect species on apple trees (Bhalla and Pawar, 1977), 70 species on pear, 80 species on peach, 60 species on plum, 30 species on apricot (Butani, 1979), 85 species on grapevine (Tandon and Verghese, 1994), 175 species on mango, 182 species on banana (Dhaliwal et al., 2006) and 250 species of insect and mites on citrus (Pruthi and Mani, 1945; Wadhi and Batra, 1964; Rajput and Hari Babu, 1985; Tandon, 1993) have been reported. The important insect-pests of fruits are as follows:

Mites are small arthropods which attack number of crops damaging different parts of the plants (leaves, buds, flowers and fruits) and due to short duration of life cycle and high fecundity, their population increases at a fast rate and when feeding in large numbers they become serious pest of many crops. Since last few years the menace of mites is on the increase in Indian sub-continent causing enormous losses. One of the probable reasons for it is attributed to excessive use of broad-spectrum pesticides, which have led to the development of resistance in mites. Further, owing to their deleterious effect on non target organisms, especially natural enemies of the mites in the ecosystem there is often a spurt in the population of mites which otherwise may be of minor pest category. Because of their small size, the infestation goes unnoticed in the beginning and by the time prominent symptoms appear a lot of damage has already been done.

FRUIT CROPS

In fruit crops, being perennial in nature, the infestation of mites not only affects the trees at a particular time but their overall vigour gets reduced which is reflected in reduction in production as well as poor quality of the fruit in the years to come. The identification characters, nature of damage and the symptoms must be well understood in order to manage the mite pests effectively. A number of mites are associated with various fruit crops and those infesting major fruit crops are discussed herewith.

The vegetables form an essential component of the human diet especially in case of India and some South Asian countries where sizeable population is vegetarian. India ranks second in the production of vegetables after China and occupy 5.993 million hectares area and the total annual production is around 90.83 metric tonnes (Gopalakrishnan, 2007). There is a need of around 5-6 million tones of food to feed 1.3 billion India’ population by 2020 AD. It is an established fact that any attempt at improvement of agricultural production by using new cultivars with the recommended package of practices has invariably resulted in the increase in activity of damage by pests and diseases. Vegetables are more prone to insect-pests and diseases mainly due to their succulence as compared to other crops. The pest problems on vegetables can be more serious because of the favourable conditions which are provided for multiplication by the present methods of cultivation. The major constraints in vegetable production include the extensive crop losses due to increased pest infestation directly or due to viral diseases vectored by insects. The extent of crop losses in vegetables varies with the plant type, location, damage potential of the pest involved and cropping season. The crop losses to the tune of 40 per cent have observed in vegetable crops. The increased demand and limited productivity of local cultivars, led to introduction of high yielding varieties and hybrids. As a result dramatic changes in pest scenario occurred and minor pests became major pests. Indiscriminate use of pesticides has led to severe ecological consequences like destruction of natural enemies, effect on non-target organisms, pesticide residues in vegetables and resistance of the pests to pesticides. The modern pest management is aimed at educating the farmers on various issues of pest management like identification of the pests, natural enemies, and judicious use of pesticides with alternate methods of pest control like cultural, mechanical, biological and behavioural (use of pheromones) management. The strategy for the control of insect-pests on vegetable crops is necessarily to be different from the other crops because of the nature of utilization of vegetables. This is especially true in the case of chemical control. Insecticides which are highly toxic and are known to leave hazardous residues cannot be recommended on vegetables. The vegetable crops have been grouped into summer and winter vegetables depending upon their season of cultivation in majority of areas. The present chapter deals with the insect pests infesting summer and winter vegetables and their possible management options.

Chemicals which are used specifically for the control of mite pests are known as acaricides, though there are many insecticides, which show acaricidal properties as well. In the last few decades, there has been tremendous progress in the development of broad-spectrum acaricides i.e. the compounds that will knock down different species of mites at the same time. Prior to the commercial introduction of broad-spectrum insecticides like DDT and other organochlorine insecticides, mites did not commercially cause wide-spread damage under natural or semi-natural environments which were little influenced by man. This might be due to the natural processes of prey-predator relationship in undisturbed situations. Contrastingly in situations where broad-spectrum pesticides are commonly used, the natural enemies are more adversely affected than the mites, and an outbreak of the latter occurs. Besides becoming generally intensified with the introduction of modern insecticides, the mite problem in some cases has subsequently become even more serious due to development of resistance against these materials.

Many spider mite species, which were rarely found in pest form in some situations, appeared commonly as major pests with the persistent use of pesticides. In Indian literature, spider mites were never reported in pest form prior to 1940 but with the intensive use of pesticides, every year new mite problems are appearing and becoming troublesome to control.