Rajasthan govt actively pushes natural farming; 250K farmers on board

As many as 250,000 farmers are practising natural farming in Rajasthan as the state carries out a plan to increase yields sustainably, said a senior agriculture department official.

 

The state government’s goal is to nudge farmers towards chemical-free practices that also increase incomes. “To promote natural farming, the state government has announced a comprehensive and visionary action plan. Under this, 250,000 farmers are being connected to natural farming,” he said. 

Under the National Mission on Natural Farming, the central government contributes 60 percent and the state 40 per cent in financial assistance to 225,000 farmers. The state separately provides assistance to 25,000 farmers. 

Under the National Mission, 2,000 natural farming clusters spread over 100,000 hectares have been set up in all 50 districts of the state. 

“Special training is being provided to farmers for effective implementation of the mission. The Natural Farming Centre in Udaipur has provided training to agriculture departmental officials and scientists from agricultural universities,” the official said.

 

Awareness programmes on natural farming are being organised in some clusters. Selected farmers are provided Rs 4,000 per acre through direct benefit transfer for natural farming.

 

This funding is proving helpful in establishing infrastructure for on-farm input production units. The government is ensuring that farmers have easy access to natural fertilisers and organic inputs at the local level. For this, the agriculture department has set up 180 bio-input resource centres.

 

“Under the action plan, a provision of Rs 1 lakh is made for each centre to enable the production of natural fertilisers locally.”