Young Biotech entrepreneur G. V. Sudarshan from Gobi, has been at the forefront of research and innovation for years now. His father G.V. Viswanathan is from Gobi and Sudarshan is a son in law of Coimbatore.
The 37-year old biopreneur completed his B.Sc Bio Chemistry at P.S.G. College of Arts and Science. Sudarshan has been part of the family run Provimi Products Private Limited, a company which had pioneered in manufacturing animal feed and feed supplements for some time.
"My father and the ecosystem created by him have really helped me move further into a hitherto unexplored area," grins Sudarshan. Since 2011, he has part of the Technology Business Incubation (TBI ) at Tamilnadu Agricultural University (TNAU) and has created a number of innovative products.
Sudarshan added further: "TNAU has been encouraging biopreneurship and offers space in order to incubate ideas. Entrepreneurs enroll themselves and TNAU provides technology support by fine tuning research while also helping the person get certifications/ validations that are required for commercialising the concept or product. We document the field trials and submit the details to the people at the University and they give us qualitative inputs."
Talking about his product, 'Herboliv +' , he said it was developed at Gobi and tested in his own 40-acre field at Kongali. "Basically it has three purposes: pest control, nurtures crop growth and keeps animals away. The application of 'Herboliv +' in our farm has stopped animals from entering the farm, that is close to the forest."
The product was innovated on Dasagavya, an organic preparation to repel pests successfully and then created. Finally, it was tested and validated through TNAU in 2 years (2015).
Now Herboliv +' is being used by farmers in their vegetable fields, banana and sugarcane farms. "Recently, we sent 1300 litres of' Herboliv +' to the Saffron Research Institute in Kashmir and this will hopefully be used to control porcupines entering the saffron growing areas".
He earlier visited Pulwana in Kashmir to do a field trial. "Now a farmer near Pollachi has been successfully using it to get rid of a new disease. This product has been tested safe for residual analysis from the nationally accredited toxicology lab at TNAU," said Sudarshan.
He had also experimented with the product at Arsha Vidya Gurukulam at Anaikatti by using it in their vegetable farm under the guidance of Poojyashri Dayananda Saraswathi. "When Swamiji wanted to know if it was hazardous as it was making elephants run away, I got it tested and proved that it was non-hazardous in nature, " he said. The entrepreneur calls it an 'Ahimsa technology'.
The biopreneur's innovation 'Herbal Boost Forte' helps reduce Ammonia emissions in poultry by improving digestion. It's not only eco friendly but also can be used as a 5 per cent replacement along with 95 per cent of poultry feed. The effects have been tested and proven at the Namakkal Veterinary & Research Institute.
The other innovation 'Livestock' is actually a type of value added herbal bran for the cattle. It helps in the reduction of methane emissions by improving overall feed digestion. It helps reduce animal stress and extensive field documentation was done on it with the involvement of livestock inspectors.
"Our five- year R & D data was based on the cows being nurtured at our farm in Kongali. This innovation reduces bad odour in cow dung while also improving butter fat to 5 per cent. This helps the dairy farmer get an additional Rs.4 per litre of milk. If used at the reproductive stage, milk yield will improve. It can be used in goshalas too and will eventually bring down the cost of maintenance," asserts Sudarshan.
The products are bio intelligent, he says. "The world is now moving towards a non- toxic, non-chemical period and our products are sure to find more traction as time goes by. We have registered our brands and the IPR as well. Meanwhile, we are taking our products forward commercially in a big way and hope to achieve national presence in future," signed off the biopreneur.