DSR technology fails to attract farmers despite incentive

Paddy sowing using Direct Seeded Rice (DSR) technology has been started from today onwards. The government is putting in a lot of efforts to promote this technology, but still farmers are shying away from adopting this technique. An incentive of Rs 1,500 per acre has failed to attract the farmers towards this technology and while ignoring it, they are still preferring the traditional method of puddled transplanting of rice (PTR) in majority of the paddy sown area.

Ludhiana district was the only district to record minimal contribution to DSR technology during the last paddy season. Of the total 2,53,328 acres under DSR in Punjab in 2024-25, Ludhiana district had a share of only 3,928 acres, which accounts to only 1.55 per cent.

Gursewak Singh, a farmer from Barudi village, said that he tried sowing paddy through DSR for one year and though the incentive would help him in his next inter-crop, but the money was transferred into the account during the wheat season. “What was the use of the money when the payment got delayed. So, I thought it is better to stick to the traditional method only,” he said.

Another farmer, Harvinder Singh from Samrala, added that the incentive of Rs 1,500 per acre is too meagre. “The government should increase the incentive to at least Rs 2,500 per acre so that more and more farmers feel motivated to adopt this method,” he said.

For Tejinder Singh, a farmer from Raikot, it is the technical know-how which comes in between his adoption of this technique. “The incentive is a pulling factor, but we have to fill the details online for the same. I am not technologically sound to do that. The Agriculture Department do organise camps for the same, but it consumes lot of time. So incentive is not a pulling factor for me,” he said.