Certification of farmers doing natural farming

Tribune News Service

Shimla, August 13

To give further boost to zero budget natural farming in the state, the government is working towards certifying at least 15,000 farmers and apple growers practising chemical-free cultivation by March.

“We have started working on the certification process and once it happens, the farmers will get much better price for their produce,” said Onkar Sharma, Principal Secretary, Agriculture, while touring the Mashobra research centre of the Horticulture University, where an apple orchard has been raised using natural methods in just a year.

Rs 25,000 subsidy

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To encourage people to take up natural farming, the government is giving a subsidy of Rs25,000 to purchase indigenous cows, a prerequisite for natural farming, and other aid.

—Onkar Sharma, Principal Secretary, Agriculture

Sharma said around 65,000 farmers and 6,700 apple growers had already adopted natural farming. “We are very pleased with how this apple orchard has come up. We are asking orchardists to practise natural farming on a small portion of their orchard initially. Once they start and see the results, we are sure they will completely switch to natural farming,” he said.

While apple growers at many places have complaints regarding the size and colour of fruit this year, largely because of the adverse climatic conditions, Sharma said the orchardists practising “natural farming were not facing problems regarding size and colour”. “Besides, the shelf life of a naturally grown apple is much longer vis-à-vis those grown with the help of chemicals,” said Sharma.

Sharma said the government was giving a subsidy of Rs 25,000 to buy indigenous cows, “a prerequisite for natural farming”, and some other assistance. “While the input cost is almost negligible in natural farming, the productivity is much higher compared to chemical-driven agriculture,” said Sharma.