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  • From: "Tradingpost" <tradingpost@lobo.net>
  • To: livingontheland@lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: [Livingontheland] A Farming Model To Sustain The World
  • Date: Fri, 08 Jan 2010 12:34:08 -0700


A Farming Model To Sustain The World
By Devinder Sharma
http://www.countercurrents.org/sharma080110.htm
08 January, 2010
Devinder Sharma Blog

Ten years from now, in 2020, when we try to look back, Indian agriculture and
for that matter global agriculture can be transformed into a healthy and
vibrant system where farmer suicides have been relegated to history, where
distress and despondency has been replaced by the lost pride in farming,
where agriculture becomes truly sustainable in the long run, and does not add
heat to the global environment.

As we enter 2010, the script for a futuristic agriculture which brings back
the smile on the face of farmers, without leaving any scar on the
environment, is being rewritten.

What began as a small initiative some six years back in a non-descript
village in Khamam district, has now spread to over 20 lakh acres in 21
districts of Andhra Pradesh. I remember when I first talked about the miracle
brought about in village Pannukula in Andhra Pradesh, many thought I was
simply trying to romanticise agriculture. How farming can be done without the
use of chemical pesticides, I was repeatedly asked.

Pannukula dug out a lonely furrow, but eventually blazed a trail. In the next
four years, more than 318,000 farmers in 21 out of the 23 districts of Andhra
Pradesh have discarded the intensive chemical farming systems, and shifted to
a more sustainable, economically viable and ecologically friendly
agriculture. A silent revolution is in the offing. In Kharif 2009, some 14
lakh acres was covered with what is now known as Community Managed
Sustainable Agriculture (CMSA).

As I write this in the first week of January 2010, the area had expanded to
20 lakh acres of 21 districts. Six lakh acres increase in a farming system
that does not use chemical pesticides, and is also phasing out chemical
fertiliser, that too in matter of few months, is a record of sorts. And all
this has happened without any push from the government agencies and the
private sector. I see no reason why this environmentally safe, and a
farmer-friendly system of sustainable agriculture, cannot cover 200 million
acres across the country in another ten years or so if the government gets
serious.

Six lakh acres increase in a farming system that does not use chemical
pesticides, and is also phasing out chemical fertiliser, that too in matter
of few months, is a record of sorts. Ten years from now, in 2020, when we try
to look back, Indian agriculture can be transformed into a healthy and
vibrant system where farmer suicides have been relegated to history, where
distress and despondency has been replaced by the lost pride in farming, and
where agriculture becomes sustainable in the long run and does not result in
climate change.

What began as an experiment to evolve a farming system without the
application of chemical pesticides is now also phasing out the use of
chemical fertilisers. It uses a mixture of scientific proven technologies,
indigenous knowledge and traditional wisdom. Farmers are replacing chemical
fertilisers and pesticides with microbial formulations, intensive use of
composting techniques, vermi-composting, and apply bio-fertilisers, and use
bio-extracts for controlling pests.

It therefore brought in a complete shift from conventional agriculture and
offered secure and stable livelihoods. The crop yields have remained the
same, the pest attack has drastically reduced, and the soil is returning back
to its natural fertility levels. As soil fertility improves over the years,
crop yields have started going up still further. More importantly, farmer's
expenditure on health problems emanating from pesticides application has also
gone down by 40 per cent on an average.

There is more money now in the hands of the farmers. The cost of cultivation
per acre has also come down by 33 per cent. Take the case of cotton, a CMSA
farmer saves more than Rs 12,500 per hectare in a year on account of no
application of pesticides alone. With his crop productivity remaining stable,
cotton farmers have got a new lease of life. The environment too has become
healthier and safe.

Normally, 56 per cent of the cost of cotton cultivation is primarily on
account of pesticides. And don't forget, elsewhere in the State and for that
matter in the country, 70 per cent of the farmers who are committing suicide
are engaged in cotton cultivation. No farmer has committed suicide in the
areas where non-pesticides management system of farming is being followed.

More money in the hands of farmers means less debt. I haven't seen any other
village in the country in past three decades of my work in agriculture, which
has been able to recover its entire mortgaged land from the money lenders in
just three years of adopting non-pesticides management. This happened in
village Ramachandrapuram in Khamam district where all 75 farmers have even
paid back the outstanding rate of interest.

Studies in five districts show that out of the 467 families that had
mortgaged their land, at least 386 have recovered it in two years time.

This is a roadmap for the future of Indian agriculture, and for that global
agriculture. It not only provides a sustainable path, with a very low carbon
footprint, and has tremendous potential to remove poverty and hunger. It has
been conclusively demonstrated that household food security has improved with
a 40 per cent drop in the purchase of food from the market. The crop yields
have gone up, and farmers are now able to cultivate two crops in a year. This
is the Zero Hunger model that I normally talk about which needs to be adopted
under the proposed National Food Security Act.

Women and farmer Self Help Groups' play a critical role in CMSA. Savings have
increased, and a federation of 850,675 self-help groups now involves 10
million women from the poor households. This federation now holds a corpus of
US $ 1.5 billion providing a bundle of economic services. No wonder,
sustainable agriculture without external inputs can revolutionise the rural
landscape, where hunger and poverty becomes history.





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