FENVALERATE 0.4% DP Cotton Spotted Bollworm
B. Mission Organic Value Chain Development for North Eastern Region 5.3 Basic Information
5.4 Critical Issues
5.4.1 Organic Certification: There are two ways of accreditation and certifying mechanism viz;
Participatory Guarantee System (PGS) is a quality assurance initiative that is locally relevant, emphasize the participation of stakeholders, including producers and consumers and operate outside the frame of third party certification.
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For quality assurance, the country has internationally acclaimed certification process for organic produce in place for export, import and domestic markets.
National Programme on Organic Production (NPOP) was launched in the year 2001 under Foreign Trade & Development Act (FTDR). Regulatory body of NPOP under FTDR act is Agricultural and Processed Foods Export Development Authority (APEDA) under Ministry of Commerce. It is referred as Third Party Certification involving an independent agency for verification and certification of organic production processes. For international trade, NPOP system has equivalence with Europe and USA. All the importing countries in South-East Asia, Europe and USA are accepting the NPOP certified products. In case of domestic trade, 80-85% of the NPOP certified produce is consumed within India.
The Bureau of Indian Standards has developed a voluntary domestic standard for organic farming in consultation with ICAR, APEDA, MOA, FSSAI and SAUs.
5.4.2 Assistance for chemical fertilizers and organic fertilizers
In order to enhance even the efficacy of chemical fertilisers and for improving crop response to the applied fertilisers, use of organic fertilisers is required.
Therefore, for sustained agricultural production, the Integrated Nutrient Management, which envisages soil test based use of chemical fertilisers in conjunction with organic fertilisers (Compost, Farm Yard Manure etc.) is accepted as a good practice and therefore, recommended.
Chemical fertilisers are made available to the farmers for purchase at subsidised prices. Following table shows approximate amount of subsidy given on chemical fertilisers required for crops viz. wheat, paddy and pulses as per the balanced nutrient management.
Name of Crop
General Nutrient Dose(Integrated Package) (Kg/hectare)
General Chemical Fertilizer Dose + FYM/Compost
(Kg/hectare)
Approx Subsidy on
chemical fertilizers (Rs/hectare) N P K FYM/
Compost
Urea DAP MOP FYM/
Compost Rice 60 40 30 10000-
12000
110 90 50 10000- 12000
3300 Wheat 90 60 30 10000-
12000
150 130 50 10000- 12000
4400 Pulses 10 20 20 2500-
3000
25 45 33 2500-
3000
1200
As average nutrient (N/P/K) content available in organic manures/fertilisers is about 1%, requirement of organic fertilisers as per recommended doses of nutrients from organic fertilisers alone, is shown below:
Name of Crop Approximate Requirement of FYM/Compost (metric tonnes/hectare)
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Rice 16
Wheat 16
Pulses 3.5
Organic farming is a sustainable form of agricultural production based on the standards notified from time to time. Under organic farming standards, organic fertilisers are recommended to be produced on farm itself through composting of locally available material such as farm waste/cow dung/waste straw etc.
No subsidy is given on prices of organic fertilisers that are marketed such as city compost and vermin-compost etc. The delivered prices of city compost and vermin-compost are about Rs 5500-6000/ metric tonnes (MT) and Rs 7500- 8000/tonnes respectively. Besides, compost is bulky in nature as well. In view of above, purchase of organic fertilisers from the market, its transportation to the farms and storage is both costly and a challenge.
Organic manure to the extent of 25-30 tonnes per annum can be produced through vermi-composting of locally available waste in a pit/unit of size 7‟x3‟x1‟.
Accordingly, financial assistance @ Rs 5000 per unit is given under Paramparagat Krishi Vikas Yojana (PKVY) scheme of National Mission for Sustainable Agriculture (NMSA) for construction of vermin-composting units (size 7‟x3‟x1‟), which includes assistance for procurement of earth worms, preparation of pits, labour charges and other raw materials required etc.
Apart from above, under NMSA, financial assistance @ 50% of cost subject to a limit of Rs 5000/ per hectare and Rs 10000/- per beneficiary is also provided for promotion of organic inputs (manure, vermin-compost, bio-fertiliser, waste compost etc) on farmers‟ fields.
In sum, Organic farming relies on on-farm resource management based on locally available natural resources through creation of on-farm infrastructure facilities for production of organic compost, manure and other botanical bio- pesticides. Hence, agriculture departments of each State Government will have to chalk out their on-farm production plan for organic inputs for ensuring its adequate availability and also promote city compost.
5.4.3 Where should this may be promoted: Organic farming is advantageous particularly for the resource poor small and marginal farmers of rain fed areas where the use of costly chemical fertilizers is lower than national average. To begin with, strategically, organic farming can be focused on the following:
Area expansion: Areas with crops of higher market potential when produced organically,
Areas with already active organic farmers groups, especially small and marginal farmers who are constrained to practice intensive conventional farming. States of Odisha, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu & Kashmir, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat and parts of Maharashtra and Karnataka have large areas under rain fed farming with little irrigation support. They can be targeted for conversion to organic farming.
Regions/Areas of high biodiversity and ecologically fragile regions. States of North East Region, Jharkhand, Uttarakhand and Rajasthan are mostly under mono crop and can be focused for conversion to organic farming.
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In addition, to expansion of area under organic farming, introduction of Domestic Organic Standard to cover animal husbandry, food processing, labelling, storage and transport is suggested to provide a boost to organic production.
Other strategies include capacity building of farmers through training and demonstrations, incentives for marketing and branding of organic products, incentives to set up State Certification Bodies and incentives for technology development.