ICAR and FCI Sign MoU on Safer Foodgrain Fumigation Methods

The correct answer is ICAR-CIPHET, Ludhiana, the Central Institute of Post-Harvest Engineering and Technology, which will carry out the two-year Phase-I of the project on alternatives to chemical fumigation in wheat and rice. Option A is wrong because the Indian Agricultural Research Institute works on crop improvement and allied research and was not named as the implementing body here. Option C is wrong because, although wheat is central to the trials, the institute at Karnal does not figure in this agreement, which was signed with a post-harvest engineering institute precisely because storage and fumigation are post-harvest problems. Option D is wrong because the Central Warehousing Corporation appears only as one of the warehousing systems where bagged grain will be treated during a trial, not as the implementing institute. The MoU itself was signed on 30 September 2026.

The correct answer is aluminium phosphide and malathion. For decades these two have been the mainstay of post-harvest pest control in the country’s grain reserves, and their widespread, repeated use is what pushed pest resistance to 72 to 100 per cent in key states while raising fumigation cycles and costs. Option B is wrong because nitrogen and carbon dioxide are the alternatives being tested under this project, not the chemicals being replaced, which is the exact swap an exam setter would use. Option C is wrong because neither of those insecticides is named in connection with this grain storage programme. Option D is only partly right and therefore wrong as a whole: phosphine appears in the trials in combination with carbon dioxide, while chlorpyrifos has no place in this story at all.

The correct answer is a one-year multi-location trial across agro-climatic zones. Phase-II follows the two-year Phase-I pilot and is designed to test the methods in varied conditions so that region-specific Standard Operating Procedures can be established. Option A is wrong because the two-year, single-institute work describes Phase-I, which ICAR-CIPHET at Ludhiana will run, and not the phase that comes after it. Option C is wrong because no immediate nationwide rollout was announced; the whole point of a phased design is to validate the gases first, including nitrogen above 99 per cent purity in metal silos. Option D is wrong because the project is a field research programme on alternative technologies, aimed at scalable and sustainable substitutes, rather than a paper review of the existing rules.