The one positive outcome of the stubble problem has been the sudden realisation of the idea of permaculture or natural farming, especially among a small number of farmers in the country.
A couple of farmers in the border district of Tarn Taran in Punjab began trying out this method, where the stubble is allowed to be mulched on top of the soil, almost 20 years ago. Different techniques are adopted to sow seeds and harvest crops. Their idea was to go organic and save the money they would have spent on fertilisers and pesticides. With blame for the smog in the National Capital Region being put on stubble burning in Punjab, the state government's agriculture department and Punjab Agriculture University's extension centres are looking to find a solution to stubble burning. The curiosity of farmers in the surrounding villages has also been kindled. There is hope that some others will join the journey which could be rewarding. But it could be a long journey.
Inspired by Japanese philosopher and farmer Masanobu Fukuoka's The One Straw Revolution, the basic idea is to return to the earth whatever grows on it. And in the process energise and fertilise the soil, without any chemicals. It follows the natural cycle of the ecological system, and should eventually reduce farming costs, reduce if not eliminate waste, do away with chemicals and thus make the produce organic, reduce pollution all round, and develop community values. The practice could make the soil more fertile, facilitate multiple crops at a time, make sowing seeds easier depending on the scale, and enable water conservation.
Punjab's Krishi Vigyan Kendra (KVK) has been promoting similar practices as part of its anti-stubble burning campaign, and is now implementing it on 1400 acres in two border villages. The aim however, is to expand the land area on which the practice of stubble mulching is carried on.
Right now it is being practised on a small scale. The equipment being used currently includes what is known as a 'happy seeder', a mulcher, a super straw manager and a reversible plougher. The equipment is loaned at almost no cost by the KVK. But for such a farming practise to grow big, they will have be bought in a cooperative manner, with or without subsidies.
How to scale it up is a big issue. Policy analyst Devinder Sharma says, “There is no one size fits all possibility in this”. The state government, which offers an 80 per cent subsidy for crop residue management on site for cooperative societies, and 50 per cent to individual farmers, has in the last two years, conducted workshops to educate farmers. They have also taken farmers on visits to farms where it is being done successfully.
The happy seeder, a machine that is hinged on to the tractor, chops the residual paddy-straw, sows wheat into the soil, and then spreads the straw over the sown area, by way of mulching. It costs Rs 1.3 lakhs after a subsidy of 33 per cent.
A study by Ridhima Gupta of the Indian Institute of Science Education and Research and E. Somanathan of the Indian Statistical Institute has found that by using the machine to mulch the straw and sow wheat, the cost advantage—at the current price of the machine—is only marginal compared to burning the stubble and preparing the soil for the next crop. But if further subsidies are offered and some farmers buy and use it, the demonstration effect could have many others following suit.
Farmers availing of the subsidy will necessarily have to stop stubble burning. But the issue is, given the fragmented and dwindling size of land holdings as one generation gives way to the next, will big machines be worth investing on? Also will they work on small farms?
What remains to be seen is whether farmers, unhappy with the incentives given to them to stop burning stubble, take to permaculture on a scale that will do away with the need to burn stubble, and thus reduce winter smog in the NCR, Punjab and Haryana. Punjab chief minister Capt Amarender Singh says he cannot stop the farmers from burning their stubble for now. But he also asserts that he sees far less smoke from the fields than he used to, a few years ago.
