Since the last one decade, the area under Rice-Fallow has been invariably documented around 11.7 mha. During the period, significant technological advances in RCT, Conservation Agriculture, crop husbandry and varietal development have occurred. ICAR also sanctioned one- two mega network projects to this end. Besides, Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers' Welfare also provided policy support. Still, Rice-Fallow area has remained almost the same. This calls for revisiting the efforts made, and refining the future strategies.
Its a nice question i think. Farmers do not take any new technologues until observing enough profitability of that. Pressure does not work on real situation so you have to motivate about input output ratio then rice fallow area can decrease.
Yes, I agree with you. This means the efforts have not addressed this specific question. But those efforts (might) have contributed to the development of rice-based industry in many other ways. So need research to identify the problems and drivers behind this issue.
Erroneous estimates of rice-fallow area in India have been reported after 2000 A.D. For example, Subbarao et al. (2001) reported about 11.7 million ha area under rice-fallow. In another recent estimate by Gumma et al. (2016), rice fallow area in South Asia has been around 22.3 million ha with 88.30% in India. The discrepancy in these two estimates seems to be due to differences in the methods of mapping rice-fallow cropland areas. Owing to several technological and policy interventions, it may be expected that the area under rice-fallow in India might have come down. However, digital mapping of the exact area and precise assessment of impact of technological and policy interventions are required afresh.
A National Seminar was organized on August 26, 2021 to discuss the issues related to technological interventions and their adoption in rice-fallow areas of eastern India. All the resource persons including chairman of the technical session were unanymous on widespread extension and adoption of resource conservation technologies, rejuvenation of water harvesting structures and short duration improved varieties of pulses (chickpea, lentil, grass pea, green gram and black gram) and oilseeds (linseed, toria and safflower). Wherever micro-irrigated systems have been created, high value crops (vegetables, spices and aromatic crops) were suggested for cultivation. There was consensus on the adoption of technologies which are relatively scale and location neutral (eg., zero tillage, seed priming, etc). The need for seeking farmers' opinion (participatory approach) was also realized. The details are available at the link given below:
https://icarrcer.icar.gov.in/wp-content/uploads/ICAR-RCERNewsMaterialNtionalSeminaronRiceFallow-ManagementinEasternIndia.pdf
To boost farm productivity, the government intends to focus on four factors: shift to high-value farm products, irrigation, seeds and fertilizer and new technology. Agriculture Transformation Index, which will measure the performance of States across six pillars: inputs, sustainability, productivity and diversification, policy, preservation, processing and exports, and farmers' income and welfare.The increase in intensive farming, including the use of cover crops in lieu of fallow practices, has caused a loss of acreage of fallow land, as well as field margins, hedges, and wasteland. Therefore, in order to maintain the fertility of the soil, we have to substitute fertilizers with organic manure or leave the field uncultivated (fallow) in between two crops. The use of manure improves soil texture as well as its water retaining capacity. It replenishes the soil with nutrients.
Farming practices which will help to reduce the effect of fallow land:
1. Crop rotation.
2. Crop combination.
3. Proper irrigation facilities.
4. The proper dose of fertilizers.
Other benefits of fallowing soil are that it raises levels of carbon, nitrogen and organic matter, improves moisture holding capacity, and increases beneficial microorganisms in the soil and field that has been allowed to lie fallow for just a year produces a higher crop yield when it is planted. However, it was generally considered that rice production was associated with massive limiting factors, such as variety, climate, terrain, and soil properties. Three challenges stand out among the rest: water availability, low or unstable output prices, and environmental regulations. Nearly 99% of growers cited at least one of these as among the top three challenges facing their operation, and 16% of growers cited all three. Of course, none of these challenges are new.
Dear Dr Rk Naresh, Thank you for participating in the discussion.
Dear Dr Rk Naresh, Thank you for participating in the discussion.
Dear Dr Rk Naresh, Thank you for participating in the discussion.
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