Sustainable Farmer-friendly Technologies for Management of Natural Resources in Eastern India

Abstract

The present paper identifies the major natural resource constraints of eastern and north-eastern regions of India to promote sustainable agriculture. Technological options available in three areas, namely, utilization of water resources; managing degraded soils, especially the acid soils; and soil health maintenance over the years, have been discussed. Important technologies for water use, such as rain water harvesting and water conservation, water management in hilly and sloping areas, land shaping for crop diversification, zero tillage, mulching, besides some novel agro-techniques have been presented in detail. Soils under upland and medium land physiography of eastern India suffer from soil acidity constraints, which drastically reduce crop productivity and soil health. Farmers grow rice in these lands and leave major part as fallow during the post-rainy season, as the region is primarily rainfed. Technology of lime application in furrows either singly or with organic manure along with balanced use of fertilizers has been successful in several states of India with the farmers. This practice needs to be promoted among the farmers of the acid soil regions, based on the soil-health cards being provided to the farmers. Other soil-health-related-constraints responsible for the low agricultural productivity of the region include large scale promotion of soil test based balanced nutrient use, soil organic matter maintenance through use of quality organic manures and crop residues, restoration of degraded soils, checking soil erosion and soil pollution etc. Technologies to address these problem areas with farmers’ participation have been discussed in the light of the area-specific needs and perceptions. It is a must to adopt a mission-mode approach for rapid transfer of some of these technologies for doubling farmers’ income without adversely affecting the natural resource base of the country