Devlal Munda, who lives in Kaudi village of Ramgarh district in Jharkhand, was doing chemical farming on his 1.5-acre ancestral land till 2023. Due to the extensive use of chemical fertilisers and the vagaries of climate change, the quality of soil started deteriorating. Farm-friendly insects had also started disappearing from his farm. The yield was good, but the expenditure on fertilisers was increasing year after year, which started bothering him.
In the same year, he came to know about the agroecology-based programme, JIVA, launched by the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development to promote natural farming. It was being promoted by the Gramin Seva Sangh and the Patratu Tribal Project Development Committee, with the help of the national agriculture and rural development bank. Six villages – Lem, Bicha, Armadag, Jobo, Kodi and Lowadih – from Saki, Baridih and Bicha panchayats in Patratu block – were selected for the implementation of this scheme.
“In this project, which was started with the help of Rs 30 lakh from NABARD, farmers were trained to adopt natural farming. They were taught how to make cow dung manure and seeds were provided to them for free,” Vilas Sathe, Gramin Seva Sangh secretary, told Mongabay India.
Munda decided to take advantage of this scheme. However, he had to face many difficulties.
Market is the weakest link
In 2023, 80 farmers, including Munda, from six villages started practising natural farming on parts of their ancestral land. By the next year, the number of these farmers increased to 125. They started growing vegetables in their baris (kitchen gardens) along with paddy.
Since initially there were not many indigenous paddy seeds available for natural cultivation, these farmers kept their produce for consumption and sale as seeds. They adopted the same method in 2024 as well. But this year, their problems are going to increase.
Munda told Mongabay India, “When the seeds are available to everyone, then who will buy them? We are all trying to find a market for paddy. But for this, the production will have to be increased and one-fourth of the farmers of the area will have to be connected to natural farming.”
Ram Kumar Oraon, who lives in the nearby Bichha village, told Mongabay India, “We are going to the market, but no one is ready to buy our paddy. Traders say that our produce is coarse. Our ask is that if the government rate is Rs 22- Rs 23, we should get Rs 28- Rs 30.”
A three-year study conducted by the Indian Council of Agricultural Research and the Indian Institute of Farming Systems and Research mentions that medium and small farmers in India do not have any marketing channels to sell their produce directly to consumers. Thus, farmers practicing Zero Budget Natural Farming face real constraints in marketing their produce, which impacts their income.
When the National Mission on Natural Farming was launched in November 2024, it mentioned that farmers would be provided with an easy certification system and uniform branding so that their natural farm produce could reach the market. The plan was to enable their natural farming produce to reach the market. It will be geo-tagged and referenced in real-time through an online portal.
However, Ishtiyaq Ahmed, who is associated with the “Regenerative Bihar” campaign and works with 3,000 farmers, told Mongabay India, “Nearly 86%-87% farmers in India are marginal farmers. They do not have the capacity to take their produce to the market on their own, as they use most of it themselves. In such a situation, creating a strong chain of aggregators is more important than branding products.”
Experts suggest that there is a need to come up with innovative ways of linking the market to the farmers. Ahmed says, “We distribute meals in school under the mid-day meal scheme as well as in Anganwadis. We can connect the farmers who have adopted natural farming to these schemes. We already have readymade markets in villages. We must think innovatively now.”
Elaborating on practical difficulties, Oraon says, “We did talk to some schools about buying Ragi. They are buying the flour for Rs 45 per kg. On the other hand, we sell our ragi crop Rs 45. Buying flour, cleaning it and grinding it reduces the price by 10%-12%. It includes labour costs as well. Our flour was costing Rs 60 per kg.”
The farmers also face a lot of difficulties while selling organically-produced vegetables. Unlike paddy, it is very difficult to store vegetables for even a day or two due to the lack of cold storage facilities in villages. In such a situation, they have to sell their vegetables at the same rate as the chemically-grown vegetables, that too in their villages.
“Right now, no big company is buying vegetables from us,” says Munda. “We are not able to sell vegetables commercially. We face more problems selling than growing. The problem is that our products are not getting enough recognition. Even if people are keen to buy, they get discouraged after looking at the rates.”
However, food and agriculture policy expert Devinder Sharma has a slightly different opinion. He tells Mongabay India, “Farming has a price. We have left it to the environment. For every kilo of food we consume, we cause three times more damage to the environment. People need to be made aware of that cost. The government needs to start a campaign to raise awareness.”
Separate support price
In India, agricultural policy is primarily built around Minimum Support Price, a system that was introduced in the 1960s. Back in the day, the objective was to motivate farmers to grow crops like rice and wheat with the help of new technology after the Green Revolution. The aim was to protect farmers from market uncertainties and get them a better price for their produce.
At present, 22 crops are included in this scheme. If we talk about paddy, the support price of the normal variety of paddy has increased by Rs 243 in three crop years.
However, there is no mention of a separate MSP in the National Mission on Natural Farming. It does, however, mention that natural farming methods will help farmers reduce the cost of cultivation and their dependence on resources purchased from outside.
“There should be a separate system for MSP. The indigenous crops being produced using natural farming methods should get a higher rate than chemically-produced crops. We should get at least 20% to 25% more,” demands Oraon.
Agricultural experts also agree with Oraon. Ahmed says, “Just promoting it will not do anything. We do not have MSP for natural farming. There is no system of government procurement. So, how will we get a different rate?”
The main objective of promoting natural farming is to save agriculture from the ill effects of climate change. That is why experts like Sharma suggest adding environmental value to it. He says, “The price that natural farming should be fetching needs to be seen from the perspective of ecosystem service. Natural farming improves the quality of soil and helps save water, so its value should be determined. It should then be linked to MSP. Until and unless incentives are spelled out, farmers will not be encouraged to take it up.”
Seeds and natural fertilisers
Natural farming is not a new concept in India or in the tribal- dominated state of Jharkhand. Farmers have been farming in the traditional way for generations. But, in the 1960s, the Green Revolution was adopted with the aim of becoming self-sufficient in grain production and the yield increased manifold. Due to this, indigenous seeds also started vanishing. If we talk only about paddy, then we have lost about 94% of our rice varieties.
This is why when farmers from Kaudi village of Ramgarh district went out in search of indigenous paddy seeds in 2023, they found only three varieties. Munda says that in 2024, the number went up from three to five.
“To tackle the issue of vanishing seeds, an exhibition of indigenous seeds was organised in Kaudi village in 2023. Those who donated indigenous seeds were rewarded,” informs Sathe.
Another practical problem is regarding cow dung manure. Although there is an emphasis on the use of dung of indigenous cows in natural farming, farmers are using dung of all kinds of cattle. Munda says that it is very difficult to do natural farming by relying only on cow dung.
Balkrishna Jha, a scientist associated with natural farming at the Ranchi Research Centre of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research, told Mongabay, “Decrease in livestock led to a scarcity of natural fertilisers, hence farmers switched to chemical fertilisers. In addition, 10 to 15 tonnes of cow dung manure is needed for one hectare. It is a bit difficult to carry so much manure. Farmers can easily bring a bag of manure on a bicycle or bike.”
Although natural farming is cost-effective, the yield is also less in the initial years. Hence, the study by Indian Council of Agricultural Research and the Indian Institute of Farming Systems emphasises on a large-scale assessment before trying out natural farming.
This article was first published on Mongabay.
