The Hindu Business Line : ‘Rice intensification movement being adopted in several States’

Coimbatore, Dec. 2 “System of Rice Intensification (SRI) is not a technology. It is a movement that is being promoted extensively. Unfortunately, there is no lobby to push it because the fertiliser subsidy in India is huge, at Rs 22,000 crore,” Dr Norman Uphoff, Scientist, Cornell University, said here on Tuesday.

SRI is a methodology for increasing the productivity of irrigated rice cultivation by changing the management of plants, soil, water and nutrients, according to Cornell International Institute for Food, Agriculture and Development Web site. SRI practices lead to healthier, more productive soil and plants by supporting greater root growth and by nurturing the abundance and diversity of soil organisms, it added.

Talking to reporters after inaugurating the three-day national symposium on SRI in India–Policies, Institutions and Strategies for Scaling up SRI, he said: “Though preliminary reports signal greater adoption of SRI, there was no compilation of data on the area under SRI. It has reached respectable levels in select states such as Tamil Nadu, Tripura, Andhra Pradesh, Orissa, West Bengal, Assam, Himachal Pradesh and others with several farmers adopting the movement under different agro-climatic zones. Our goal is to help farmers adopt SRI in at least 20 per cent of the irrigated area by 2015.”

Other crops

“The movement was initially intended for increasing rice production under irrigated conditions, but it can be extended to other crops such as ragi, sugarcane, red gram, mustard and under rain-fed condition as well,” Dr Uphoff said, and added that the movement was more relevant now as it aimed to help the country meet demand by improving food productivity, saving water, reducing fertiliser use, improving ecosystem and avoiding water-related conflicts.

SRI involves the same agronomic practices as with usual rice production — nursery, transplanting, weed control and manure application — but the activities are drastically different from conventional rice farming practice.

Until now, the focus was on developing high-yielding seeds. SRI, unfortunately, is not a seed-based improvement, but skill-based agronomic intervention, the scientist explained.

This national symposium has been jointly organised by the Tamil Nadu Agricultural University and World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) through WWF-ICRISAT (International Crop Research Institute for Semi-Arid Tropics) project, Hyderabad.

The other collaborating institutes include Sir Dorabji Tata Trust, Mumbai; Directorate of Rice Research, Hyderabad; Central Rice Research Institute, Cuttack; Directorate of Rice Development, Patna; and the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development.

The organising institutions and collaborating agencies stressed the need for a “SRI Mission” on the lines of the agriculture technology mission.

Besides rice, the collaborating agencies have started working with the farmers in Uttar Pradesh towards improving sugarcane productivity. A pilot project has been initiated in about 150 acres in four districts of Andhra Pradesh.

“They are following the pit method and it is working well,” Dr Biksham Gujja, Project Leader, ICRISAT–WWF Project, said.