Sri Lanka's experiment with organic agriculture.

Sri Lanka's President talks at the UN General Assembly of his country banning chemical fertilisers and pesticides. 

Pic courtesy: Tamilguardian.com

It was expected. The uproar over Sri Lanka’s path-breaking decision to go organic is on the predictable lines. The same arguments, the same kind of fear psychosis, and the bogey of ideological thinking that will take the world backwards should not come as a surprise anymore. Any possible disruption to the power equilibrium dominated by agribusiness giants is sure to be backed by an orchestra playing the usual wrong concerto. 

Even before the UN Food Systems Summit recognised the need to move towards a healthier, more sustainable and more equitable food systems, Sri Lanka had made a bold resolve a few months earlier to put the concept of agro-ecological transformation into action by banning the imports of chemical fertiliser and pesticides, through a gazette notification on May 6, 2021. Coming before the ban on palm oil imports and the directive to growers to uproot the existing plantations in a phased manner, Sri Lanka has shown a remarkable determination to make a transition towards a healthy and sustainable future for farming. 

Addressing the UN General Assembly in New York on Sept 22, President Gotabaya Rajapaksha said: “Sustainability is the cornerstone of Sri Lanka’s national policy frame work. Because of the impact on soil-fertility, biodiversity, water ways and health, my government completely banned the use of chemical fertilisers, pesticides and weedicides earlier this year,” adding that the “production and adoption of organic fertiliser as well as investments into organic agriculture are being incentivised”. 

For a country reeling under a huge foreign debt burden, with as much as 80 per cent of the revenue collected going towards debt servicing, and at the same time faced with severe food shortages at home, the Sri Lankan President has so far stood firm against the panic being created in the name of growing food insecurity arising from an anticipated drop in production. This reminds me of a similar kind of pressure built within days after former President Suharto of Indonesia had banned in one go the use of 57 chemical pesticides on paddy under a presidential decree in the late 1980s. This was in response to an unprecedented attack of brown plant hopper pest on paddy, and it was on the advice of the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) and the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) that the late President Suharto then launched integrated pest management in paddy. 

An impression is being created as if Sri Lanka’s food crisis is the result of the nation’s shift towards organic farming. Well, that is incorrect, a propaganda drummed up by the chemical industry. In reality, the ban on chemical fertiliser and pesticides came into effect only in early May, and since then there is only one cultivation season, called Yala - sown in May and harvested in August, but even before the crop hit the market, fears over declining yields were already rife. What needs to be known is that it is generally in the 2^nd and 3^rdyear after the chemical use has been stopped that we can see the yields tapering off before it stabilises, and then slowly begins to rise. In any case, the external cost that intensive farming systems leave behind is often taken as a price that the society inevitably has to pay. To illustrate, the rice belt in the north is witness to renal failure in a big way among the rural poor, which many believe is linked to excessive use of chemical fertilisers and pesticides, while a number of experts discount any such link.   

A report in The Independent, London, says that more than 20,000 people have died from the Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD) as it is called, and has rendered over 400,000 sick in the past 20 years. 

In the case of tea also, the second-largest export commodity, again an unnecessary scare is being created. Already the yields are very low, with FAO estimating that the yields have been continuously on the decline in the past decade, dropping to 350 to 400 kg per acre in large areas, and even to 150 kg per acre in some cases. With nearly 75 per cent of the tea growers being small, soil degradation is among the prominent reasons for the falling yields. The advantage in going completely organic is that in years to come, applying suitable agro-ecological approaches in cultivation practices, Sri Lanka can build on soil health thereby rejuvenating the tea gardens. It can create a niche in the global market with organic tag being it’s USP. Considering that the demand for organic food products is raising globally, Sri Lanka is placed in an advantageous position given its head start provided of course it takes the right steps to guide the transition. 

The challenge before Sri Lanka is to redesign its research, development and production approaches. It has to first begin by reorienting the national agricultural research programmes suitably altering the educational curriculum. Research priorities need to shift based on validating and protecting community knowledge and innovations. Especially to address the complexities of climate change, traditional varieties and the richness of available diversity offers immense resilience. Care must be taken to ensure that the transformation process is participatory; forcing it down on farmers will not work in the long run.   

For those who doubt whether agro-ecology – and it includes organic, natural and biodynamic farming systems etc -- can feed the world, and if yes then how to achieve food system transformation, a 2019 report by the FAO’s High Level Panel of Experts (HLPE) on Food Security and Nutrition, details the pathways. It also quotes a meta-analysis (2017) by Raffaele D’Annaolfo et al which has conclusively brought out the economic gains accruing from agro-ecological farming systems. Accordingly, the yields increased in 61 per cent cases analysed, decreased in 20 per cent, while farm profitability increased in 66 per cent cases. 

It requires courage to stand up alone. And it happens only when you believe in something that you stand for. President Rajapaksha’s tryst with organic farming may eventually open the door to the future of global farming. #

Source: Sri Lanka goes organic. The Tribune. Oct 2, 2021. https://www.tribuneindia.com/news/comment/sri-lanka-goes-organic-318938

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Tamil Nadu shows the way to rebuild agriculture

Source: web 

The maiden agriculture budget by Tamil Nadu has brought a whiff of fresh air in policy planning. Not only dedicating the budget to the farmers protesting against the three central laws, what makes Tamil Nadu’s farm budget so special is how the Minister for Agriculture and Farmer’s Welfare MRK Pannerselvam has managed to open a new chapter by bringing back the focus on revitalising agriculture. 

Tamil Nadu it seems has confided more on economist F E Schumacher concept of Small is Beautiful– emphasising on small and appropriate technologies as well as approaches, and invested on conservation and building up of the natural resource base.  

Coming at a time when Tamil Nadu tops the national chart in farm indebtedness, in fact three of the top five indebted states hail from the southern region, the integrated approach the separate budget has laid out to rebuild farm livelihoods and to also attract youth in farming, is a pathway which in reality challenges the dominant economic thinking of moving people out of agriculture in the name of economic growth. While mainline economists celebrate this in the name of growth, in my understanding speedy urbanisation actually is a reflection of the neglect and apathy agriculture has suffered over the decades. 

According to the 2011 Census, more people in Tamil Nadu have moved out of rural to urban areas than in any other state. This is a trend that needs to be reversed. In fact, the massive reverse migration the country witnessed when tens of millions of daily wage workers walked back hundreds of kilometres to their villages after Lockdown 1.0 was imposed shows the dire need to reverse the flawed economic thinking that has pushed people from the rural areas in the first instance. Keeping agriculture deliberately impoverished all these years was the easiest way to do so. No wonder, as per Economic Survey 2016, the average farm income in 17 states of India, which means roughly half the country, hovered around Rs 20,000 a year. With such meagre annual incomes, farmers are left with little choice but to migrate. 

Not only showing an intent to reverse this faulty economic design, Tamil Nadu also demonstrate an inclination to do so. Attaining village self-sufficiency in the next five years, for which a project called ‘Kalaignar’s Anaithu Grama Oruginaintha Velan Valarchi Thittam’ has been launched, is a step in the right direction. Although only 2,500 village panchayats will be covered in the first phase, the aim is to cover the entire 12, 524 village panchayats before the state goes to polls again. An allocation of Rs 250-crore has been made for it. This may seem to be insufficient but when seen with the outlays marked for various other related schemes and programmes like village pond restoration, enhance soil fertility, greening of 11.75 lakh hectares of fallow lands in the next ten years, setting up drying yards, encouraging terrace vegetable gardens, to link millets, pulses, and oilseeds cultivation with PDS supplies, setting up farmer markets and providing for agri-processing and value addition, and a horde of other initiatives shows how keen Tamil Nadu is to change the face of its rural landscape. 

What seems fascinating (and at the same time challenging) is the policy thrust to revive the rural economy, with emphasis on farmer-centric approaches. This became possible after senior officials had gone in for an elaborate and widespread consultative process, involving all kinds of stakeholders, which brought innovative ideas as well as measures that were essential to revive farming. Instead of talking only to economists and business leaders in pre-budget exercises, Tamil Nadu reached out to farmers, activists and civil society organisations. This exercise will only remain useful if the stakeholders continue to keep a tab, ensuring that the government focus does not deviate in the years to come. 

Perhaps it is primarily for this elaborate consultative process, Tamil Nadu has made allocations for setting up a Nammalvar Organic Farming Research Centre at the TN Agricultural University, and also launched a programme to conserve traditional paddy varieties, naming it after Nel Jayaraman. In addition, a separate wing for organic farming is proposed to be created under the state agricultural department. A provision for subsidy support for organic farmers has also been made. 

Turning farming into a profitable enterprise is certainly not possible till suitable policies are laid out to retain and attract youth in farming. Although Tamil Nadu has announced a ‘Rural Youth Agricultural Skill Development Mission’ with the aim to provide the right kind of skills to the youth, and also launched programmes for capacity-building for students passing out from the agriculture university, assured income by way of an assured price remains the hallmark for converting agriculture into an economic activity. The Centre has a bigger role here, first by providing the right prices, and also must collaborate with states to bring the youth back into agriculture. It’s time to know that even in the US, the number of young in agriculture has gone up by 11 per cent between 2017 and 2019. China is planning to send 10 million youth back to the villages by 2022. 

At a time when the Periodic Labour Force Survey 2019-20 estimates that 44 per cent of the country’s workforce is engaged in agriculture, and considering that the size of the farm workforce has expanded in the post-Lockdown period, policy makers need to accept that it is no longer advisable to continue with the outdated economic thinking of keeping rural wages low so as to encourage out migration. This has to change if the country is to realise the Prime Minister’s vision of Sabka Saath Sabka Vikas. Let us not forget, agriculture alone has the potential to provide gainful employment to a large section of the population. 

Tamil Nadu has shown the way. While a lot will depend on how the budget proposals are implemented, it has certainly laid out a roadmap for bringing back the focus on an economically-viable and sustainable small-scale agriculture. #

Source: Reviving Indian agriculture is a key to jump-start the economy. Bizz Buzz, Hyderabad. Aug 27, 2021. https://epaper.bizzbuzz.news/Home/ShareArticle?OrgId=278ad7b4de2&imageview=1&fbclid=IwAR0IKlTiglJSjyx5sqVxj6KJPfO8-kCATCZvHUt2hT4cpD4NS92s2aDgaV8

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Towards an Organic Future

Its high time to move to agro-ecological farming systems. 

Pic -- from the Web

At a time when global temperatures are soaring, a latest study by a French think tank – Sustainable Development and International Relations (IDDRI) – has shown that agro-ecological farming alone has the potential to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in Europe by 47 per cent and thereby keep global temperature rise below 2 degrees.  

This study comes at a time when the Food and Agricultural Organisation of the United Nations (FAO) is already talking of green direct payments to organic farmers who opt for sustainable farming practices. At the Regional Symposium on Agro-ecology for Sustainable Agriculture and Food Systems for Europe and Central Asia, 2016, one of the policy recommendations was to shift 30 per cent of the European budget on agriculture to green direct payments. The IDDRI study in addition shows that a transition from intensive farming to agro-ecological farming will bring down the pesticides consumption by 380,000 tonnes per year in European farming.

And yet I find that most climate mitigation studies point to more crop intensification, which will expectedly lead to freeing up larger proportion of cultivable lands and thereby claim to ensuring there is no drop in food production. In other words, it is push for a hyper-intensive farming system that leads to more toxic soils, more water mining sucking the remaining aquifers dry, and leading to more contamination of the food chain. This flawed assumption was essentially behind the launch of the New Vision for Agriculture at the World Economic Forum 2009 aiming at increasing food production by 20 percent, decreasing greenhouse gas emissions per ton by 20 percent, and reducing rural poverty by 20 percent every decade.

The 17 agribusiness giants that would spur the launch of New Vision for Agriculture includes Archer Daniels Midland (ADM), BASF, Bunge Limited, Cargill, Coca-Cola, DuPont, General Mills, Kraft Foods, Metro AG, Monsanto Company, Nestlé, PepsiCo, SABMiller, Syngenta, Unilever, Wal-Mart, and Yara International. In other words, it is more of the same leading to more catastrophic outcomes in the future.

The IDDRI study provides a lot of hope at a time when the UN-sponsored TEEB initiative – The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity – for agriculture and food, has in its latest study warned of a significant contribution to greenhouse gas emissions emanating from farming practices. Accordingly, the entire farming production systems, stretching from cutting down of forests for making land available for cultivation to food waste dumped in landfills, account from 47 to 51 per cent of the global gas emissions. This factor alone plays a prominent role in world’s climate going topsy-turvy, and which returns to haunt farming community reeling under the terrible impact of climate change. The challenge therefore is how to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture, which becomes a surer form of mitigation for farmers from the chaotic implications from climate aberrations haunting them in the years to come.

What is therefore of paramount importance is to bring in policies that help farmers to transit to a more climate resilient agriculture. Before apologists for Green Revolution kind of farming systems raise on uproar over declining food production from a shift to organic farming, it is important to know that in its earlier study along with the UK-based Soil Association, the IDDRI has in a report entitled ‘Ten Years of Agro-ecology in Europe’ clearly showed that it is possible to feed Europe a healthy and sustainable diet by transiting to natural farming systems. Earlier, an International Assessment for Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD) report, which was ratified (India included) during an intergovernmental plenary in Johannesburg, April 7-12, 2008, had warned that ‘business as usual’ is not the way forward.

Over the years, an emerging consensus has developed around agro-ecology, which alone has the potential for an inclusive approach, and has immense ability to reduce the damage being done to the planet. In India, a major initiative was launched when village elders in Punnukula village in Khamam district in Andhra Pradesh came together to stop the use of chemical pesticides. This was way back, more than 15 years ago. This local initiative, and exemplary testimony to the richness of available local knowledge, led to the introduction on Non-Pesticides Management (NPM) under the Community Managed Sustainable Agriculture (CMSA) expanding to 3.6 million acres without the use of pesticides. After the State’s bifurcation, and driven by the enthusiasm shown in adopting NPM practices, Andhra Pradesh launched Zero Budget Natural Farming aiming to bring its nearly 60-lakh farmers under the fold of non-chemical agriculture by the end of the year 2024.

Surprisingly, there is no drop in crop productivity. Just a year after the introduction of ZBNF, a study by Rythu Sadhikara Samstha  (RySS) based on crop cutting experiments showed that crop yields in fact had gone up from 10 to 69 per cent – 10 per cent in irrigated paddy and the highest 69 per cent in brinjal. Since wheat is not grown in south India, it is not possible to know the impact on wheat yield when grown without chemicals but I am sure suitable farming practices can be evolved that keeps productivity at par. More so in a state like Punjab, which ironically being the country’s food bowl still imports a significant proportion of its wheat atta requirement. Much of the attathat is imported is from Madhya Pradesh considered to be free of chemicals. I fail to understand why can’t instead Punjab focus on organic wheat production within the state if the domestic demand is so heavy.

This will require a paradigm shift in the way agricultural research is being conducted. All these years for instance crop varieties have been evolved based on its response to chemical fertilizers and pesticides. It’s time to move to organic breeding, developing future crop varieties responding to organic manure, less water and needing no chemical pesticides. This has to be followed by adequate reforms in agricultural markets, providing a higher price for organics and also providing for exclusive procurement of organic produce coupled with policies that encourage farmers to make the transition. With soaring demand for safe and healthy food, mainline agriculture research has no option but to keep pace with the changing times.

According to Friends of Earth, in Europe alone, climate change has taken the lives of more than 115,000 people since 1980, causing an economic loss of Euro 453 billion. In the global south, floods, drought, heatwaves and other extreme climate related events/disasters results in hundreds of thousands of people dying every year. Instead of just blaming the weather gods, the time has come to urgently reform the prevalent farming systems so as to move away from intensive cultivation that has denuded soils, mined groundwater and is increasingly leading to desertification. #  

Towards an Organic Future. The Tribune. May 1, 2019

https://www.tribuneindia.com/news/comment/towards-an-organic-future/766290.html?fbclid=IwAR2iVNBXwK4HB4Vrf26I6rik6emnO3mEsnZDual1UKawwpN8E7rsVfPewsg

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