Stubble Management: अनाज के बाद अब पराली को भी MSP पर खरीदेगी सरकार

Stubble Management: अनाज के बाद अब पराली को भी MSP पर खरीदेगी सरकार

Stubble Management: हरियाणा में भी बढ़ेंगे गन्ना के दाम, पराली एमएसपी पर खरीदेगी सरकार सिरसा। (Rajender Kumar) पड़ोसी प्रांत पंजाब द्वारा गन्ना के दाम में बढ़ोतरी करने के साथ ही हरियाणा में भी किसान दाम बढ़ाने की मांग करने लगा है। हरियाणा के कृषि एवं किसान कल्याण मंत्री जय प्रकाश दलाल ने आज सिरसा में बताया कि हरियाणा सरकार भी गन्ने की फसल के दाम बढ़ोतरी को लेकर विचार कर रही है। उन्होंने बताया कि राज्य…

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किसानो की बल्ले बल्ले, अब MSP पर पराली खरीदेगी हरियाणा सरकार

किसानो की बल्ले बल्ले, अब MSP पर पराली खरीदेगी हरियाणा सरकार

हरियाणा: किसानो के लिए बडी खुशी की खबर है। जब जल्द ही हरियाणा सरकार मोटे दामो मे पराली खरीदने वाली है। एक ओर प्रदूषण से राहत मिलेगी, वहीं किसानो को पराली की कमाई हो सकेगी। अगले सीजन मे होगा लागू: प्रदेश मे लगभग 70 लाख टन पराली निकलती है जिसमे से 15 से 20 लाख टन पराली का ही प्रयोग किया जा रहा है। शेष बची पराली को किसान मौका पाकर जला देते है। हरियाणा सरकार ने पराली का न्यूनतम समर्थन मूल्य (MSP) तय…

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Will hold tractor parade towards Delhi on Jan 26 if demands not met: Farmer unions

NEW DELHI: Hardening their position ahead of the next round of talks with the government, protesting farmer unions on Saturday said they will take out a tractor parade towards Delhi on January 26, when the country will celebrate Republic Day, if their demands are not met. British Prime Minister Boris Johnson will be in the national capital on January 26. He will be the chief guest at the Republic Day parade which will be held at Rajpath. Addressing a press conference, farmer leader Darshan Pal Singh said their proposed parade will be called “Kisan Parade” and it will be be held after the Republic Day parade. The next round of talks between the government and protesting farmer unions is scheduled to be held on January 4. On Friday, the unions had announced that they would have to take firm steps if the meeting fails to resolve the deadlock. Swaraj India leader Yogendra Yadav said it is a “plain lie” that the government had accepted 50 per cent of the farmers’ demands. “We have got nothing on paper yet,” he said. After the sixth round of formal negotiations on Wednesday, the government and farm unions reached some common ground to resolve protesting farmers’ concerns over rise in power tariff and penalties for stubble burning, but the two sides remained deadlocked over the main contentious issues of the repeal of three farm laws and a legal guarantee for minimum support price (MSP). Farmer leader Gurnam Singh Choduni said, “In our last meeting, we posed a question to the government that will you buy 23 crops on MSP. They said ‘no’. Then why are you misinforming the people of the country?” So far, over 50 farmers have been “martyred” during our agitation, he said. Braving the cold, thousands of farmers, mainly from Punjab and Haryana, are protesting at various borders of the national capital for more than a month against these three new laws. The government has presented these laws as major agriculture reforms aimed at helping farmers and increasing their income, but the protesting unions fear that the new legislations have left them at the mercy of big corporates by weakening the MSP and mandi systems.

source https://bbcbreakingnews.com/2021/01/02/will-hold-tractor-parade-towards-delhi-on-jan-26-if-demands-not-met-farmer-unions/

5-fold spike in stubble burning set to choke north India

As if the Covid-19 pandemic wasn’t enough, residents in north India, including Delhi-NCR, could well be heading for winters far more polluted than in the last three years. Satellites have detected an almost five-fold increase in the number of crop residue burning instances in Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh in the first week of October in 2020 than during the corresponding period since 2017 to 2019.

According to the Agriculture Ministry, satellites detected 208 incidents of farm fires on just a single day, October 5. Of them, 163 were detected in Punjab, 30 in Haryana and 15 in UP.

Between October 1 and 5, 894 paddy crop residue burning events have already been detected as compared to 184 in 2019, 263 in 2018 and 652 in 2017. Punjab is leading in farm fires with 700 events, followed by 146 in Haryana and 48 in UP. The number of burning events was highest on October 5 in Punjab in the last 4 years.

According to the Ministry, in Punjab, burning/fire events were concentrated in Amritsar, Tarn Taran, Patiala, Gurdaspur, Ferozepur, Ludhiana, Sangrur and Fatehgarh Sahib districts. Last year, only 79 events of farm fires were detected between October 1 and 5 in Punjab. The number of farm fires was 117 in 2018. On October 5, total 163 farm fires were reported while 16 in 2019, 56 in 2018, 106 in 2017 and 95 in 2016. This is despite the fact that the Punjab Government had spent more funds than Haryana and UP in the past two years on trying to get farmers implement farm waste management practices. But farmers say they do not have any option but to burn.

In Haryana and Uttar Pradesh, the burning events were scattered. As many as 86 farm fires events were detected in Haryana this year during the same period while 87 farm fires events were reported in 2019; 208 in 2018 and 100 in 20117. Most farm fires events were detected from Ambala, Kurukshetra, Kaithal, Jind and Fatehabad districts.

In UP, most farm fires events were detected from Sitapur, Meerut, Aligarh, Bareilly, Ghazipur, Sambhal, Shamli and Saharanpur districts.

“A sharp increase in stubble burning was observed around Punjab, Haryana, and neighbouring border regions. Boundary layer wind direction is favorable for transport (of pollutants). It will start impacting Delhi in the coming days,” the System of Air Quality and Weather Forecasting and Research (SAFAR) said.

Officials said that wind directions have changed to north-westerly and this will cause pollution to Delhi-NCR. Stubble burning causes a smog-like situation in Delhi-NCR every year post autumn, creating a health hazard for its residents.

Interestingly, the Supreme Court on Tuesday agreed to examine a suggestion that full Minimum Support Price (MSP) should be released to farmers only after a verification that they didn’t burn stubble. The court posted the matter for further hearing to October 16 after SG Tushar Mehta said the Centre would file a reply on the issue.”

Taking note of air pollution, the Prime Minister Office has held a high-level meeting with northern States to chalk out a policy and measures in advance to control stubble burning.

Despite a ban on stubble burning in Punjab and Haryana, farmers continue to do so because of lack of financial incentives to switch over to environment-friendly farm waste management practices. Last year, Punjab produced around 20 million tonnes of paddy residue of which farmers burnt 9.8 million tonnes of it while the figures in Haryana stood at 7 million tonnes and 1.23 million tonnes respectively. State Governments were now providing 50 to 80 per cent subsidy to farmers and cooperative societies to buy modern farm equipment for in-situ management of paddy straw.

Source: https://www.dailypioneer.com/2020/pioneer-exclusive/5-fold-spike-in-stubble-burning-set-to-choke-north-india.html

How India can eliminate the burning of crop waste | Opinion - analysis

The burning of stubble left in the fields of north India after the harvesting of paddy causes a severe spike in air pollution. To farmers, this is the cheapest way of clearing their fields in a short period before the wheat crop’s sowing season starts. However, severe air pollution leads to a health emergency. There is panic and outrage, the odd/even scheme is introduced, and schools are shut. In international media, the key takeaway is to avoid India. Banning the burning, and implementing the ban effectively, is the obvious response. However, the use of coercive State power against farmers for enforcing such a ban is just not feasible. The state governments know this. Weaning farmers away from growing paddy would do away with the problem. This has been advocated for some years now to conserve groundwater, which is being depleted rapidly and would result in a water crisis. It would reduce state subsidies in providing free electricity for irrigating such a water-intensive crop, and procuring it at the Minimum Support Price (MSP). With lower subsidies, farmers’ incomes could rise with the appropriate cropping pattern. But so far, this has been too difficult to attempt for the political leadership, and illustrates how difficult it is to change any entrenched subsidy regime. It is unrealistic to expect farmers to forego income for the sake of the environment. However, if they see economic gains in switching to alternative crops and patterns, they will come forward. There is a successful example of triggering fundamental transformation in farm practices. The ITC, known for its e-choupal initiative, ran a Baareh Mahine Hariyali (greenery for the whole year) programme in four districts of Uttar Pradesh last year. It saw the doubling of incomes among farmers who adopted the full programme. Farmers who adopted the programme partially saw incomes going up from between 30% to 70%. This led to a public-private partnership between ITC and Niti Aayog to take the programme to 27 districts in eight states. Here, an attractive solution was the use of Happy Seeder, where the stubble is cut and left on the field to mulch enriching the soil, and the wheat seed is planted. The government has a scheme to provide a 50% subsidy for the purchase of Happy Seeders by farmers, and this goes up to 80% if, say, 15 farmers form a cooperative. There are other ideas, too. With some treatment, the crop residue could be used as cattle feed. But this has to make the journey from concept to the market. The other idea is to convert crop waste into biofuel for use in transport. A Mahindra group Company has tied up with Indraprastha Gas Limited for this. Stubble can also be converted into bales for which there is potentially a niche market. If other usages emerge, as it is for bamboo, the potential becomes much larger. All these possibilities must be pursued. But the crisis needs an immediate solution. This sense of urgency has led to the idea of giving the farmer additional cash along with the MSP if the paddy waste is not burnt, to compensate him for the extra cost of not burning it. The subsidy required for full compensation is far too high. There are solutions which will not require any subsidy. The crop waste can be converted into briquettes, which work as a substitute for coal. The National Thermal Power Corporation has successfully blended these with coal, to the extent of 10% in their thermal plants. The market-discovered price through procurement of briquettes has not added to the cost of power. This, then, is a market-based solution that has worked. To scale it up to solve the problem fully over the next two to three years, it must be announced that the briquettes made from crop residue would be purchased at an attractive price for use in the thermal plants in north India. This price signal would drive market forces to deliver. Briquette-making plants, which do not cost much, would buy the crop waste from farmers at a price which earns them a reasonable amount after covering the cost of collecting the stubble and delivering it. Briquettes made would be sold to thermal plants, and it will give returns on investment. This will eliminate the burning of the crop waste in the next two to three years. Policies would need to be continuously calibrated to support the best outcome for farmers as well as the environment, factoring in technological progress and behavioural changes. Ajay Shankar is a distinguished fellow at TERI The views expressed are personal . Source link Read the full article