AMN / NEW DELHI
Government is promoting organic farming for improving soil health and water retention through the schemes of Paramparagat Krishi Vikas Yojana (PKVY) in all the States/UTs and Mission Organic Value Chain Development for North Eastern Region (MOVCDNER) exclusively for North Eastern States. Both the schemes stress on end-to-end support to farmers engaged in organic farming i.e. from production to processing, certification & marketing and post-harvest management training and capacity building.
Minister of State for Agriculture & Farmers’ Welfare, Bhagirath Choudhary in a written reply in Lok Sabha today. said that Indian Council of Agricultural Research operates All India Network Programme on Organic Farming (AINP-OF) with 20 collaborating centers covering 16 States and has developed organic package of practices for 76 cropping systems. The results showed improvement of soil physical, chemical and biological properties resulting in better micro environment for crop growth and productivity, compared to conventional farming. Better resilience of crops to weather extremes have also been observed under organic farming.
Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare has taken various initiatives to build Digital Public Infrastructure (DPI) for agriculture as an open source, open standard and interoperable public good through various digital initiatives, such as:
AgriStack: Under the Agristack initiative, the Government has initiated the development of three core registries, viz. Farmers Registry (Registry of Farmers), Geo-Referenced Village maps (of the Farmland plots) and Crop Sown Registry through the Digital Crop Survey (DCS).
DCS allows capturing of crop being grown and irrigation sources/ methods being used on a parcel of land. This allows the government to understand ground truthing real time data that allows planning to:- 1. Crop diversification 2. Millet promotion 3. Procurement planning 4. Identify risk prone areas and plan intervention accordingly.
Under this project, a detailed soil profile study is being carried out to create standardized soil maps for rational land use and crop planning, thus promoting sustainable agriculture.
A data driven approach, is being followed to improve agricultural productivity and mitigate climate change. In this regard risk and vulnerability assessment of Indian Agriculture to climate change was undertaken by Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), under National Innovations in Climate Resilient Agriculture (NICRA).
During last 10 years (2014-2024), a total of 2593 varieties have been released by ICAR, out of these 2177 varieties have been found tolerant to one or more biotic and/or abiotic stresses.
To enhance the resilience and adaptive capacity of farmers to climate variability, 448 Climate Resilient Villages has been established in 151 climatically vulnerable districts under NICRA programme. In addition, capacity building programmes are being conducted to all the stakeholders on various aspects of climate change.
Government is implementing Per Drop More Crop (PDMC) scheme in the Country under Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana (PMKSY) focusing on enhancing water use efficiency at farm level through Micro Irrigation, namely, Drip and Sprinkler Irrigation systems. The Micro Irrigation helps in water saving as well as reduced fertilizer usage through fertigation, labour expenses, other input costs and overall income enhancement of farmers. Financial Assistance @ 55% for Small & Marginal farmers and @ 45% for other farmers is provided for installation of Micro Irrigation.
This information was given by the