Haryana village shows the way in conservation agriculture

While the tale of CA in Brazil is well-known and has been replicated in Europe, India, too, is taking its first step towards adopting the practice.

A case in point is Tigra village, situated five km from Ateli on the Rewari-Narnaul road in Haryana, where farm productivity was taking a beating due to climatic fluctuations, land degradation and an unfavourable market system besides several other adverse factors, as is the case in many parts of India. The picture was bleak — until the village was introduced to CA some three years ago.

Dr I P Abrol, head, Centre for Advancement in Sustainable Agriculture (CASA), the organisation that is promoting the principles of CA across the country, says, “CA was introduced on an experimental basis in Tigra village on wheat fields. It is showing good results and has won the confidence of farmers.”

To begin with, ten farmers agreed to devote a small section of their land, roughly an acre each, to try out the new approach. They sowed seed and used fertilisers through indigenously made ‘no-till-seed-cum-fertiliser drill’, which caused minimal disturbance to the soil. While there was a better yield at the time of harvest, what convinced farmers more was a saving of Rs 1,000 per acre on tillage-related costs with no loss of productivity, said Dr Abrol. Consequently, zero-till seeding of wheat that was practised on only 25 acres in 2006, rose to 100 acres in 2007.

The credit for the effort goes to Krishi Vigyan Kendra, Mahendragarh, which is managed by Haryana Agriculture University, Hissar, and which provided the drill that cost approximately Rs 40,000. “Most farmers in Tigra now favour the practice, and have now agreed to bring the entire 1,000 acres sown area in the village under CA next year,” added Abrol. They, however, would need the requisite equipment, drills in particular, to make this happen.

Dr Abrol, however, cautions that zero-till alone cannot bring lasting benefits. “International experts say the impact of zero-till will not sustain over the years unless an entire set of supplementary measures are applied progressively and in totality. Such efforts require maintaining crop residues on the field, planning and practising crop rotation, and other practices integral to the dynamics of the CA approach, apart from conservation practices adopted to improve water availability and other constraints.”

Though the concept is global, it must be tempered with a location-specific approach, said Dr Abrol. “We need to move from piecemeal efforts to an integrated approach. To reap maximum benefits from CA, all the relevant stakeholders – farmers, policy makers and scientists – need to work in tandem. While the basic concept of CA remains the same, one has to necessarily take into consideration the local factors as well,” said Dr Abrol.

Challenges in making farmers accept CA

•Crop residue availability poses a major challenge with pressure due to alternative demand for livestock or its sale to brick kiln owners

• There was a demand for more drills with expectations that the government should initiate such a step

• There were apprehensions about weed control, which were well-founded

• While zero-till technique was applied to wheat during the rabi season, farmers were confused if the same could be applied to other crops such as bajra or mustard during kharif season. The solution lies in adaptive efforts carried out at the village level