K Ramakrishnappa
In India health and environmental hazards arising out of modern agriculture production systems have led to a growing interest in alternate farming practices that avoid the use of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides, minimize air, soil and water pollution and optimize crop biodiversity. Consequently, organic farming as a means to increase sustainability in agriculture by maintaining farm diversity and simultaneously enhancing income opportunities for small and marginal producers has made credible advancements during the past decade with the combined efforts of farmers, NGOs, Governmental interventions and market forces.
The Government of India has initiated a number of steps to promote organic farming and regulate production and marketing of organic produce in the country. In March 2000, under National Program for Organic Production (NPOP), the country has launched the National Organic Logo ‘India Organic’ and announced the NSOP standards comprising the details of growing crops and the permissible use of natural minerals and biological pest and disease control measures under organic farming. The Central Government through APEDA has also prepared and approved criteria and procedures to accredit agencies for organic certification, announced inspection and certification procedures and short listed agencies for certification. Presently, 24 accredited certification agencies are looking after the requirement of certification process and the products certified by them are accepted in many countries including European Union and USA. The Director General of Foreign Trade has laid down rules and regulations for export of organic products from India. To look after promotional and capacity building activities, a National Project on Organic Farming (NPOF) was launched under Ministry of Agriculture during 2004, which
P. K. Shetty, Claude Alvares and Ashok Kumar Yadav (eds). Organic Farming and
Sustainability, ISBN: 978–93–83566–03–7, National Institute of Advanced Studies,
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is being operated by one National Centre of Organic Farming (NCOF) at Ghaziabad and six Regional Centres (RCOFs) located at Bangalore, Nagpur, Jabalpur, Panchkula, Bhubaneswar and Imphal. To address domestic certification issues, requirements of NPOP were notified under Agriculure Grading and Marking Rules and a new logo ‘Agmark India Organic’ was launched exclusively for domestic market. Recently Minitsry of Agriculture has also launched a farmer group centric certification system under PGS-India programme.
Karnataka state policy on organic farming: The
Government of Karnataka, realising the importance of organic agriculture as early as in 2003 has set up a Mini Mission on organic farming with a mandate to study the existing agriculture situation and to recommend strategies for sustainable farming. The Mission after a series of meetings, visits and consultations, has submitted the report on the status of agriculture in Karnataka. The highlights of the paper indicates that like in other states of India, agriculture productivity in Karnataka is stagnated on account of heavy soil erosion, loss of soil fertility, salinisation of soils, declining ground water and genetic erosion of indigenous species. The other important observations of the mission include: a) high cost of production (b) young members of the farming families quitting agriculture in favour of petty jobs at urban locations (c) agro-chemicals reaching the soil and aquifer and threatening the very survival of useful micro flora (d) high levels of pesticide residues in food and water, threatening human and animal health and (e) high risk of nutrition, quality and safety of food.
The Mini Mission with the above observations has recommended to quickly overcome the knowledge gap in the existing agriculture production system and proposed to promote organic farming as a potential means to enhance agriculture production and to protect deteriorating agro-eco system. The Government of Karnataka has constituted a high level committee under the Chairmanship of the Development Commissioner cum Agriculture Production Commissioner to examine the proposal and on the recommendations of this committee, the Government announced the Karnataka State Policy on Organic Farming in March 2004.
K Ramakrishnappa 45 Salient features of the policy: (i) Promoting organic agriculture as a sustainable, safe and healthy method of farming independent of special price advantages; (ii) The approach adopted in promotion of organic farming shall be farmer centered and the programs shall create conditions for conversion and efficient use of locally available resources; (iii) Central and State Governments to provide interventions to instill confidence in the minds of farmers during conversion and learning phase; (iv) Resolving often extreme distress in rural farming communities resulting from high input cost, low returns, increased debt etc.; (v) Developing land and crop management to compensate for more adverse and more variable weather conditions; (vi) Introduce participatory approaches in promotion of organic farming by involving all stakeholders at all decision making levels, facilitated largely by the Government.
Strategies: a) Integration of all land based activities like Agriculture, Horticulture, Animal Husbandry, Sericulture, Apiculture, Aquaculture, Forestry and other land use activities in policy making and at implementation levels; b) Reliance on locally available, affordable and environment friendly inputs to be produced on farm; c) Promoting self reliance through inclusion of local seeds, manures and indigenous practices for plant protection; d) Encouraging mixed farming aimed at household food security while conserving biodiversity and local cultural values; e) Preparing farmers for competitive marketing through value addition, e.g. through partial processing, development of specialty products, good presentation and maintaining quality and safety; f) Creating consumer awareness about respectful natural farming and safe food; g) Empowering people by establishing organizational structures like Farmers Associations, PCs etc. and provide institutional support.
Specific activities: a) Production of green manure
seeds in sufficient quantities to be used by every holding and promotion of multi-purpose tree species on farms; b) Creation of infrastructures to facilitate grading, processing, packing and marketing of organic produce locally with transparent pricing and benefit distribution; c) Documentation of existing sustainable organic farming practices and to develop packages of practices by involving Research Organisations/Government Departments/
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NGOs; d) Creating awareness in the use of organic produce among consumers, large scale production by small producers of truthful organic produce certified by local agencies/ NGOs /Farmers Associations need to be encouraged; e) Creation of infrastructure for testing organic inputs and outputs (products) with effective and economic methods, test centers and sampling mobile labs; f) Supporting organic food processing industries and encourage good farmer-buyer relationships; g) Creating new market opportunities in export markets through development of value added organic products.
Interventions under National Horticulture Mission:
The Government of India in the year 2005–06 has initiated National Horticulture Mission, a centrally assisted scheme to provide holistic approach for development of Horticulture in the country and organic farming has been given a major thrust under the program. The focused activities under NHM include: a) Creating awareness on the ill effects of intensive farming and to disseminate knowledge on eco-friendly organic farming by organising awareness and training programs in association with local organic farmers group; b) Facilitating farmers to produce required inputs on farm by providing financial support for creation of low cost infrastructures for production of inputs like Vermicompost, Jeevamruth, Digester extract etc; c) Supporting farmers in the initial stages of conversion from chemical/ traditional into organic; d) Encouraging farmers/ Farmers groups in collection, grading, value addition and marketing of organic products; e) Facilitating farmers groups involved in promotion of organic farming to adopt Internal Control System (ICS) and Participatory Guarantee System in organic production system to bring in transparency, traceability and accountability; f) Organising Trade shows and exhibitions in collaboration with organic farmers associations, to establish linkages between consumers and producers for marketing of organic products in domestic and export markets; g) Encouraging Farmers and farmer’s organizations involved in scientific validation of local practices for the benefit of organic community.
Institutional support for organic farming in Karnataka
Organic village program: As per the recommendations of the state policy on organic farming, organic village programs were initiated in all the districts of Karnataka since 2004–05.
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One of the main components of this program was to convert 100 hectares of contiguous area into a model organic site on a holistic approach involving all land based developmental sectors like Agriculture, Horticulture, Watershed Development, Animal husbandry, Sericulture, Forest, besides Universities of Agricultural Sciences. This program since its inception was helpful in conversion of more than 1lakh hectares into organic agriculture in the state.
Biocentre as a resource organization: Biocentre, a certified organic centre, under the Department of Horticulture in Karnataka has been serving as a knowledge centre in promotion of organic farming in Karnataka. The centre organizes regular training and capacity building programs to farmers, extension personnel and policy makers, validate scientifically the local practices, conduct demonstrations on production and utilization of organic inputs on farm and provide analytical services to organic farmers for their inputs and outputs. The Biocentre is the largest producer and distributor of certified organic seed and planting material, and involved in conservation and development of local/traditional varieties of vegetables, medicinal and aromatic plants and heritage horticulture crops of Karnataka. Some of the important activities of the biocenter towards holistic and sustainable agriculture are:
a) Conservation, development and GI registration of heritage crops: One of the priority programs of Biocentre is to conserve and develop Karnataka’s rich horticultural diversities through identification, characterization, documentation and registration of Geographical Indications of the genetic resources under fruits, vegetables, plantation, spices, medicinal and aromatic and flower crops. Nanjangud Rasabale, Mysore betel vine, Coorg orange, Mysore Jasmine, Udupi jasmine, Hadagali mallige are the earlier crops brought under GI Registry in Karnataka. Later on Kamalapur red banana, Devanahally pummelo, Bangalore rose onion, Sagar appe midi and Udupi Mattugulla have been given Tag.
b) Organic seed and planting material: The pace of progress in organic farming largely depends upon the pace with which good quality seed and planting material of superior varieties are multiplied and made available to farmers. In this context,
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organic seed and planting material of local/traditional varieties would play a major role in reducing the cost of production and improving the income of the farmers. The Bio center has been organizing training and capacity building programs to farmers and technicians on seed production techniques of open pollinated vegetable varieties. To create farmers interest, demonstration plots of screened varieties are being established at the centre by following different crop combinations, raised bed cultivation, in situ green manure production and pest and disease management
c) Bio-digester – an innovation for organic farming: Bio- centre has taken up scientific validation of farmer traditional practices and developed different models for sustainable cultivation of horticulture crops. Bio-digester is one such innovation of the Biocenter wherein the traditional knowledge on preparation of manure in pits has been validated scientifically by seeking interactive ideas from Grape farmers of Athani, Belgaum District of Karnataka.
Jaivik Krishik Society: Jaivik Krishik Society (JKS) is a federation of organic farmers’ and organic farmers groups established in 2003 under Karnataka Society’s Registration Act of 1960. It was established mainly to cater to the needs of organic farmers in providing interventions for production, quality control, group certification and creation of market infrastructure through promotion of socio-economic, ecological values and fair trade practices in agriculture production system. The Society extends services for establishment of organic farmers associations /groups and to enroll them as its members. It also provides services in setting up of Internal Control System (ICS) and Participatory Guarantee System through local associations and creates model organic outlets at consumer points. While the farmers have benefited from the trainings, certification support, processing and value addition support in addition to marketing support lent by JKS, even for many Karnataka consumers, JKS has been the main medium for awareness-creation on the benefits of organic produce, through the many melas and fairs it has organized and the media outreach it undertook.
Organic farming is a knowledge and labour intensive agriculture production system rather than capital intensive.
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Organic farming has the potential to produce sufficient food of a high quality at a low cost on a sustainable basis. Therefore, organic agriculture is particularly well suited for rural communities that are facing the problems of low income and high production cost and breakdown in the sustainable food supply chains. However, the future of organic farming lies in meeting the challenges such as maintaining the social structure of the organic farmer groups, developing sites specific business models, creating required infrastructures for processing, handling, marketing, quality control and regulation of organic products. The establishment of Farmers Producers Company could play a key role in making organic farming a socially accepted and economically viable agriculture production system.
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