With a population of 145 crores, India is self-sufficient in its food and nutrition needs. Over the past 70 years, this has been achieved in part by the expansion and intensification of agricultural practices during the Green Revolution. India will have to produce 50 percent more food by 2050 with an annual growth of 2-3 percent in food demand.
India is likely to see a reduction in this demand for food by 2050. Continuation of the current regime of intensive agriculture – which is heavily dependent on chemical fertilizers that have reduced soil health to alarming levels – is not an option. Sole reliance on such a wasteful, energy-intensive, fossil fuel-based agricultural system seriously jeopardizes India’s food, nutrition and ecological security.
A recent Food and Agriculture report by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) highlights the growing social, health and environmental costs of the global agriculture and food system. These costs $12 trillion annually. Current production methods can meet the caloric needs of more than 8 billion people worldwide, at great cost to our society and environment. The FAO report says the hidden cost of the Indian agri-food system is the damage to health, environment and society.
The steady addition of synthetic fertilizers over the past six decades has reduced soil organic carbon content from a healthy national average of 2.4 percent in 1947 to 0.4 percent today. This is alarming and below the threshold of 1.5 percent, which is required to maintain the arable properties of the soil. Not only has this affected the prospect of food security, but it has cost India Rs 47.7 lakh crore ($564 billion) over the last 70 years, which is Rs 68,243 crore ($8.06 billion) per year in lost carbon value. .
These costs are in addition to the current Rs 2 lakh crore per year ($25 billion) subsidy to the fertilizer industry. Synthetic fertilizers also cause about 25 million tonnes of greenhouse gas emissions (CO2e), costing Rs 14,813 crore ($1.75 billion) per year. These subsidies support the wasteful use of synthetic fertilizers that directly deplete soil organic matter, emit massive greenhouse gas emissions, and seriously jeopardize India’s food, nutrition, and ecological security.
Due to this loss of soil health, the fertilizer response ratio has decreased from 12.1 kg grain per kg NPK (nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium) in 1960-69 to only 5.1 kg grain per kg NPK in 2010-17. If trends continue, India could face food shortages as early as 2035, partly due to increased food demand due to growing population, reduced productivity due to climate impacts, loss of soil health and reduced response to synthetic fertilizers. Indian agriculture cannot succeed if soil health fails.
Therefore, India must explore climate-friendly, nature-based, alternative agricultural models that reduce the risks associated with intensive agriculture, improve productivity and farmers’ livelihoods, respect planetary boundaries, and do not harm human health. India needs to mainstream such agriculture to ensure its food, nutrition and environmental security.
The Prime Minister’s National Mission on Natural Farming to safeguard Indian agriculture stands against these risks. We need to fully understand the value created by sustainable agricultural practices. Regenerative farming based on agronomic principles helps reduce input costs, improve soil health, promote equitable use of groundwater, reduce natural resource depletion and at the same time increase agricultural productivity and profitability. A recent study showed that community-managed organic farming in rural India has successfully improved the health of farmers, farm workers, their families and consumers by building social capital.
Based on such evidence, India must redesign its agriculture to sustain its food, nutrition and ecological security. This is possible by identifying and measuring systems that utilize ecological intensification, such as natural or regenerative farming.
Proponents of current dominant agricultural practices continue to rely on synthetic inputs in farming systems and instead promote sustainable intensification. While sustainable intensification involves increasing productivity per unit area by using inputs more efficiently, ecological intensification is the only promising way to reduce the vulnerability of Indian agriculture. This includes increasing the efficiency of agricultural inputs and ecosystem services based on biological pest control, such as partially replacing non-renewable resources such as synthetic pesticides and fertilizers, improving soil health and improving biodiversity.
Redesigning agriculture in India requires a focus on radical change by adopting regenerative farming and not relying solely on managing existing intensive systems, but on understanding and practicing agroecological principles, building social capital, and relying on participatory and knowledge-intensive systems. Decentralized pedagogy.
Only intensive and long-term field research in all 15 agro-climatic zones of the country will be able to scientifically establish the real benefits of regenerative farming and generate the necessary evidence, raising awareness at local and national levels about climate resilience and health and environment. The impact of regenerative agriculture. Ground-level evidence placed in the public domain will help create the political will and policy framework that will lead to the development of scale-up models for scaling up regenerative agriculture across India. It will also contribute to the country’s vision of achieving a “net zero status” by 2070.
Sandhu is a professor and director of the Federation University of Australia, and Kumar is a former vice-chairman of Niti Aayog and chairman of the First India Foundation.
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