Question : Promotion of Organic Farming

(a) whether the Government is promoting organic/natural farming as chemical- free farming;

(b) if so, the details of the area covered under organic / natural farming, State -wise;

(c) whether the Government has any scheme to provide organic certification services to individual farmers and if so, the criteria for providing the assistance;

(d) the initiatives taken by the Government to promote alternative or organic fertilizers to reduce the excessive consumption of urea in the country; and

(e) if so, the details thereof?

MINISTER OF AGRICULTURE AND FARMERS WELFARE

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(a) to (e): Government has been promoting organic/natural farming through dedicated schemes namely Paramparagat Krishi Vikas Yojana (PKVY) and Mission Organic Value Chain Development in North East Region (MOVCDNER). Farmers are provided financial assistance of Rs 31000/ ha / 3 years under PKVY and Rs 32500/ ha/ 3years under MOVCDNER for organic inputs such as seeds, bio-fertilisers, bio-pesticides, organic manure, compost/ vermi-compost, botanical extracts etc. In addition to above, support is also provided for group/ Farmers Producers Organization (FPO) formation, training, certification, value addition and marketing of their organic produce. Organic cultivation on either side of River Ganga under National Mission of Clean Ganga(NMCG) , natural farming, large area certification and support for individual farmers have also been introduced under PKVY to increase area under organic farming .

Bhartiya Prakritik Krishi Padhati (BPKP), a sub scheme of Paramparagat Krishi Vikas Yojana (PKVY) since 2020-21 is promoted for traditional indigenous practices .The scheme mainly emphasises on exclusion of all synthetic chemical inputs and promotes on-farm biomass recycling with major stress on biomass mulching, use of cow dung-urine formulations and plant based preparations.Under BPKP, financial assistance of Rs 12200/ha for 3 years is provided for cluster formation, capacity building and continuous handholding by trained personnel, certification and residue analysis.

Organic Farming has also been supported under other schemes viz. Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojana (RKVY) and Mission for Integrated Development of Horticulture (MIDH), Network Project on Organic Farming under Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR).


Individual and small organic farmers groups (5-50 farmers) may also get registered with State Agriculture Department and nearby Regional Council (RC)of Participatory Guarantee System- India (PGS-India) to certify their farm as organic under PGS. Assistance of Rs. 2700/ha for 3 years is provided for PGS Certification (Cost of Certification is directly reimbursed to Regional Council of PGS- India)

At present organic farming is taken up in an area of 38.09 lakh hectares in the country including 6.19 lakh hectares under Paramparagat Krishi Vikas Yojana (PKVY), 1.23 lakh hectare under Namami Gange Programme, 4.09 lakh hectare under BPKP (Natural Farming), and 26.57 lakh hectares under National Program for Organic Production (NPOP). The State-wise details of the area covered under PKVY, BPKP, NMCG , NPOP including area of MOVCDNER and others are given at Annexure- l.