Greening India: Volunteers to spread seed balls

Bengaluru: To increase the green cover, around three crore plant seed balls will be spread across the country this year. Uttishta Bharatha, in association with Kartavya, Hasiru Mission and other NGOs are taking up the campaign, "Spare A Day For Nature – Seed Ball Maha Abhiyana".

Mr Rakesh, head of Kartavya and a green volunteer, said that the aim of the campaign is to build urban forestry and to provide greenery in barren and manmade deserts using seed ball technique.

The campaign is kicking off at 8 am on April 23 at Krishna Rao Park in Basavanagudi. “In fact, the campaign has already begun unofficially with volunteers planting trees on the outskirts of the city and at different locations,” he said.

The seed ball technique ensures that saplings survive at least for two months without water. If these saplings can stay alive till the beginning of monsoon, then the survival rate of these plants will be more. Each volunteer will be entrusted with one area to make sure that the plants are growing, Mr Rakesh said.  

In the seed ball technique, seeds are placed in the middle of a ball made up of moist mixture of clay, red soil, cow dung and cow urine. Uttishta Bharatha has taken the responsibility to get required clay and fertile mud. The other green volunteers and partners too will pitch in.

Kartavya is a group of 40 members, comprising working people from government and private sector. Each member contributes Rs 500 which is used to carry out the campaign, Mr Rakesh said.

The cow dung and urine act as natural compost and provides microbial inoculants. The seed ball becomes hard when dried in shade. This dried, hard seed ball is then sowed or tossed in waste lands, dry lands, uninhabited lands just before the monsoon, he explained.

The rains soak the seed ball, germinating the seed inside. The sprouting seed uses the nutrients of the seed ball and grows into a tree. Seeds of tamarind, pongamia and other native species will be sowed, Mr Rakesh said.

People can volunteer and sponsor the requirements of green volunteers while they are on the job. Volunteers have been identified in other states too, he said.