Agri Future – Hands up agriculture

Posts Tagged ‘India’

Agriculture is the backbone of the Indian Economy said Mahatma Gandhi five decades ago. Even today, as we enter the new millennium, the situation is still the same, with almost the entire economy being sustained by agriculture, which is the mainstay of the villages. Not only the economy, but also every one of us looks up to agriculture for our sustenance too. Although agriculture contributes only 21% of Indias GDP, its importance in the countrys economic, social, and political fabric goes well beyond this indicator. The rural areas are still home to some 72 percent of the India’s 1.1 billion people, a large number of whom are poor. Most of the rural poor depend on rain-fed agriculture and fragile forests for their livelihoods. The sharp rise in foodgrain production during Indias Green Revolution of the 1970s enabled the country to achieve self-sufficiency in foodgrains and stave off the threat of famine. Agricultural intensification in the 1970s to 1980s saw an increased demand for rural labor that raised rural wages and, together with declining food prices, reduced rural poverty. Sustained, although much slower, agricultural growth in the 1990s reduced rural poverty to 26.3 percent by 1999/00. Since then, however, the slowdown in agricultural growth has become a major cause for concern. Indias rice yields are one-third of Chinas and about half of those in Vietnam and Indonesia. With the exception of sugarcane, potato and tea, the same is true for most other agricultural commodities. The Government of India places high priority on reducing poverty by raising agricultural productivity. However, bold action from policymakers will be required to shift away from the existing subsidy-based regime that is no longer sustainable, to build a solid foundation for a highly productive, internationally competitive, and diversified agricultural sector.

Agricultural Production has entered new era of competitive-low-cost globally oriented enterprise. The cost-benefit ratio decide the mode of Farming. Global marketing needs some changes at base level. Farmers have to be cost conscious and need new strategies of mixing various farming option like Agriculture, Horticulture, Livestock husbandry and Floriculture activities. A new model for incorporating all these fields in an eco-friendly mode is discussed. Appropriate mixed technology in tune with natural resources needed at the moment in India.. An agricultural mission for efficient Resource management should aim at bridging gap between current farm yield and potential Farm yield. Use of bio-technology and bio-informatics for identification of economically viable cropping options and combinations can not be ruled out ,however soil and environmental preservation must be kept in mind while using biotech farming options. We should talk of Eco-conducive-germplasm-base instead of high productive germplasm, un-competable to our natural resources. All these and other aspects of future agricultural scenario in India is discussed in these pages. India with 1.09 billion people and 60% of them dependent on agriculture can not be leveled with USA who has merely339 million people and only 0.7 of them dependent or agriculture. Therefore the past trend of aping USA OR EU models of agricultural development won’t help. We have to innovate new ways and means conducive to our agrarian conditions and available resource to increase our food production for growing population in future. Some of the original thoughts of the author published as e-papers are reproduced here to suggest new innovative models. Change of mind set We will need a change in the mechanism of technology dissemination thus a reformation model for extension education in India is proposed in these pages. More than 50% of our practicing farmers are women who are not exposed to technology new or old, thus a system of their capacity building and skill up-gradation shall be focused Agricultural and allied technologies tested and available in India have been the replications of commercial farming ventures of the west. I would dare to blame our policy planners for this vulnerable state de-affairs.

The green, white and blue revolutions gave us food security. The high yielding varieties and new technologies were webbed with chemical farming. Even today we have critical gaps existing in productivity of food grains between technology using farms and traditional farming practices. The chemical farming resulted in the soil degradation, water pollution, soil erosions and salinity. By now, we face land degradation problems in 173 million hectares which is around 53% of cultivated land. Annually we loose 5000 Million Tones of top soil with NPK losses of 5-8 Million tones per year. In Mahrastra a survey showed that the depth of black soil was 60 cms in 1910 which has reduced now. About 18% of it has turned as shallow land. Reduced soil depth has resulted into low productivity, increases soil runoffs and drought like conditions. Therefore to avoid these ill effects we have to link strong information and communication methods for soil mapping, annual rainfall data, rain and climatic forecasts with farming operations. Resource conservation & their proper utilization needs adequate knowledge, which could be obtained through advanced satellite system and relied back through communication mechanism. Thus, for enhancing agricultural production, communication tools have to be used. It is time for sustainable agriculture. We should make use of mud waste, farm yard manure, waste cakes, municipality wastes and green wastes for increasing phosphorus, nitrogen and micro nutrients in the soil. It has been found that these substitutes have a capacity of giving 1-2% of Phosphorus and Nitrogen and provide about 40-45% micro nutrients. Therefore, a new strategy to use crop stubs, waste tree leaves, waste orchard residues and other agriculture waste material for improving soil has to be advocated. Although we use pesticides worth 3500 crores. In urban India we use 1000 crores of pestices in domestic homes. In 1948 malaria took lives of 2-8 million people in Malaysia. With use of DDT the toll of death reduced to 17 in 1963.

Agriculture sector, world over, has experienced a phenomenal growth since the mid-twentieth century. The growth, driven by Green Revolution technology, has made a significant dent on aggregate supply of food grains, ensuring food security to the growing population. The next stage of agricultural growth however, faces a serious challenge in terms of sustainability. Whereas the main problem faced by the developing countries in the south pertains to sustainability of resource use, the main challenge facing the developed economies in the north is overuse of chemical inputs. These problems have led to increasing awareness and a felt need for moving away from the input intensive agriculture perused during the Green revolution phase, to sustainable farming in different parts of the world. While the need for a paradigmatic shift in the growth strategy is well recognized, the transition from input intensive to sustainable farming however, has certain inherent difficulties. Notwithstanding these limitations, policies in both the north as well as the south have led increased emphasis on promoting sustainable agriculture. India can safely be characterized as an agricultural country despite the recent spurt in manufacturing and services and the declining share of agriculture in the national income, since majority of its workforce (~ 65%) are still engaged in agriculture and allied activities. It has been the noblest profession in India since the time immemorial and has been carried out on sustainable basis. It is only relatively recent phenomenon that large-scale forest areas, grazing lands and waste lands have been converted into croplands to support the rising population, which has caused ecological imbalance and atmospheric pollution. With no further scope for expansion of agricultural land efforts have been made to enhance the production of food grains using high-yielding variety of seeds, fertilizers and irrigation along with advanced farm equipments. However, so-called green revolution is cofined to a few crops, viz, wheat, rice and maize and has been possible only in restricted areas, Punjab, Haryana and Western Uttar Pradesh and certain selected districts of Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra and Tamilnadu.