Agriculture contingency plans for managing weather aberrations and extreme climatic events: Development, implementation and impacts in India

Abstract

Weather and climate play a key role in agricultural production. In recent past, the increased frequency of extreme climatic events has caused enormous damage to agriculture subsectors particularly in the Indian subcontinent. The Government of India through Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) and State Agricultural Universities (SAUs) has initiated documentation of climate resilient agricultural technologies for each district in the country. These documents titled as “District Agriculture Contingency Plans (DACP)” were developed to cope with weather aberrations and minimize their impact on agricultural sector. So far, the DACPs have been prepared for 623 out of 651 targeted districts in the country and are made available to different stakeholders for implementation. Implementation of DACPs during 2014–2016 with extensive planning and collective actions among stakeholders showed positive results in off-setting of sowing area reduction under deficient monsoon rainfall in India. Weather forecasting at subdistrict level with effective linkages with India Meteorological Department and ICAR/SAUs for developing farm level climate advisories is critical for further strengthening implementation process. The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) at Bonn, Germany, 2015 based on in-session workshop recommendation, have proposed agriculture contingency plans along early-warning-systems toward coping climate change impacts. Further, these experiences of India helped the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) countries to develop a contingency template considering the vulnerability of each country. Thus, agriculture contingency plan is evolving as a future strategy to manage aberrant weather situations for ensuring food security and livelihoods in different parts of the world.