Evidences from farmer participatory technology demonstrations to combat increasing climate uncertainty in rainfed agriculture in India

Abstract

Rainfed agriculture with nearly 58% of the cultivated area is home to about 40% of human and 60% of livestock population in India and contributes 40% of the country’s food production. Even after full realizing the full irrigation potential of the country, half of the cultivated area will continue to be under rainfed farming which highly dependent on monsoon rainfall. It is widely believed that increasing rainfall variability is likely to affect the livelihoods of millions of small and marginal farmers in the years to come. The National Initiative on Climate Resilient Agriculture (NICRA) was initiated in 2011 to primarily strengthen research to address climate change and to demonstrate proven resilient practices in most climate vulnerable parts of the country. Farmer participatory technology demonstrations are being carried out since 2011-12 in 100 vulnerable districts prone to recurrent drought, floods, and extreme weather events like cyclone, heat and cold wave. Interventions broadly fall into four modules related to natural resource management (NRM), crop, livestock and fisheries production systems and capacity building. During these three years, rainfall variability such as delayed onset and prolonged breaks in monsoon was experienced in several parts of the country. A total of 1259 NRM interventions to impact resilience through in situ soil moisture conservation, rainwater harvesting and efficient recycling were demonstrated, which resulted in a significant increase in crop yields by about 20-40% even under variable rainfall situations. Short duration, drought and flood tolerant varieties in paddy, pulses and oilseeds crops were demonstrated in about 2700 ha covering 7831 farmers with adaptation gains ranging from 10 to 31% [1, 2]. Some of the climate resilient practices and technologies which have been found promising are being mainstreamed into the National Mission for Sustainable Agriculture (NMSA), a flagship government initiative for enhancing productivity and resilience of Indian agriculture in accordance with the stated aim of the National Action Plan for Climate Change (NAPCC).