Agribusiness incubators (ABI) catalyze entrepreneurship development by facilitating technology and institutionalized services. The study addresses the performance analysis of enterprises promoted through coconut sector ABIs working in Kerala. Primary and secondary data collected from 30 randomly selected ABI graduated entrepreneurs in business were used to characterize the enterprises. The results indicated that 56 per cent of enterprises joined ABIs at the nascent stage and were able to receive government funding under different subsidy schemes. Majority of enterprises (72%) shared features of micro-enterprises in terms of the number of persons employed (01-10) and annual turnover less than ` 25 lakh. Most of the micro-enterprises (66%) functioned as sole proprietary firms, whereas small enterprises were registered as limited company/partnership firms (20%). Virgin coconut oil (VCO) was the major product in 40 per cent of enterprises followed by coconut chips (20%), coconut chocolates (10%), desiccated coconut (07), neera and tender coconut water-based drinks (07%). Performances of two purposively selected enterprises producing VCO and coconut chips were undertaken using break-even analysis. Production and sales of both VCO and coconut chips were more than the calculated BEP values of 1000 litres and 500 kg respectively. This indicated that both enterprises operated at profitable levels. The findings suggest that the entrepreneurs who completed the business incubation program had greater success in their business irrespective of the business size. This can be attributed to their greater access to technologies and entrepreneurship development programmes under the ABI.

The rugose spiralling whitefly, Aleurodicus rugioperculatus Martin is a new exotic pest occurring in several crops including coconut since 2016 in India. Due to variation in the agro-climatic conditions of different regions, arthropods show varying trends in their incidence also in nature and extent of damage to the crop. Besides, abiotic factors also play a key role in determining the incidence and dominance of a particular pest and their natural enemies in a crop ecosystem. The population dynamics of new exotic whitefly species, A. rugioperculatus and their associated natural enemies was assessed on five-year-old Chowghat Orange Dwarf coconut trees at Coconut Farm of Tamil Nadu Agricultural University. The study indicated that RSW was found throughout the year on coconut and the observation recorded on weekly interval basis shows that A. rugioperculatus population escalated from the first week of July 2018 (130.8 nymphs/leaf/frond) reaching the maximum during the first week of October (161.0 nymphs/leaf/frond) which subsequently dwindled to a minimum during April. The parasitisation by E. guadeloupae on RSW ranged from 31.60 percent in Aug. 2018 to 57.60 percent in December 2018. The association of biotic and abiotic factors with A. rugioperculatus population showed a negative correlation with E. guadeloupae and C. montrouzieri. There was a significant positive correlation between maximum temperature and minimum temperature as well as relative humidity. However, rainfall showed a negative correlation with A. rugioperculatus population.

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<p>Red palm weevil (RPW) is one of the major fatal pests of coconut. Conventional extension approaches need to be refined for<br />achieving the desired outcome on adoption of integrated pest management (IPM) strategies against RPW, especially among small<br />and marginal farming communities. The pattern of incidence, severity of infestation and age of palms are the factors motivating<br />farmers for adoption of IPM practices. Taking these into account, a technology delivery approach for RPW management was<br />evolved and implemented in the entire geographical extent of 520 ha area of Edava grama panchayat in Thiruvananthapuram<br />district of Kerala state, India. This approach involves farmer participatory surveillance and monitoring with technical facilitation<br />from research institutions which is a paradigm shift to community based area wide management strategies. Besides holdings’<br />profile, number of RPW infested/lost palms and GPS (i.e., latlong) coordinates of infested palms were recorded. The spatial<br />distribution pattern was analyzed using Indices of Dispersion (ID), Patchiness (IP) Cluster Frequency (ICF) and Mean Crowding<br />(IMC) at different cluster levels (i.e., holdings, administrative segments and grids). ESRI GIS software was used to depict geospatial<br />patterns of RPW infestation. Among 5410 coconut holdings, 18.7 per cent were having RPW infested palms. The pest incidence<br />in juvenile palms was significantly higher compared to adult palms. The distribution pattern of infested palms was observed to be<br />aggregated. Knowledge level of farmers regarding aspects of pest and management was below 10 per cent. The proposed<br />methodology of participatory data documentation resulted in rapid and reliable collection of data from large area with an additional<br />benefit of experiential learning for farmers in the locality.</p>

<p>Even though fourteen improved varieties of small cardamom have been released in India so far, many of the farmers in the<br />traditional cardamom tracts still use farmer selected landraces as planting material and hence the importance of landraces is not<br />questionable. Four new landraces of small cardamom identified from Idukki district of Kerala State of India namely Pulari,<br />Pappalu, Kalarikkal Bold and Arjun were evaluated along with Njallani Green Gold (popular landrace) and ICRI-2 (improved<br />variety released by Indian Cardamom Research Institute) for growth, yield and quality characters. Eight growth characters, eight<br />yield characters and eleven quality characters were analyzed for the purpose and all of them except two yield characters showed<br />statistically significant variation indicating the occurrence of significant genotypic difference between these landraces. A comparative<br />analysis of overall performance of the four landraces was also carried out and the results showed that Pappalu, Kalarikkal Bold<br />and Pulari performed significantly superior to Njallani Green Gold and ICRI-2, the controls. Pappalu showed 132.22 per cent<br />increase in yield over Njallani Green Gold and 158.02 per cent over ICRI-2. The cumulative performance indices of all the new<br />landraces were worked out and the landrace Pappalu had the highest performance index of 30.06 followed by Kalarikkal Bold<br />(27.45), Arjun (25.57) and Pulari (24.14). All the four new landraces have been found to be superior to ICRI-2 while Pappalu,<br />Kalarikkal Bold and Pulari showed superiority over Njallani Green Gold, under preliminary evaluation.</p>

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