Scaling up of sustainable agriculture

Excessive use of chemicals in agriculture has proven adverse effects on the environment and ecosystem also. Because of growing awareness about the ill effects of chemical use in agriculture, interest in alternate methods, low on chemical use, of farming has been increasing in India and around the world. Many civil society organisations as well as state have been promoting sustainable agriculture and the use of organic inputs through different schemes and programmes. The literature cites various constraints affecting farmers’ decisions to adopt new technology. Identification of these constraints, as well as factors which can facilitate scaling up of the sustainable agricultural practices, is the need of the time, give the institutional support to sustainable farming. The objective of this research is to identify the challenges affecting the spread of sustainable farming practices and to characterise promising interventions for scaling up of sustainable farming practices. The sample population for the study will comprise of farmers at different points in the continuum from conventional chemical-intensive agriculture to only natural input based organic agriculture. Both government and non-governmental organisations facilitating different sustainable farming practices will be a part of the sample population. We intend to study different interventions whose objectives are to promote only organic inputs in different regions across India. An approximate of 150 farmers from five different locations are to be covered in the study. Apart from the promoting agencies of these five locations, we also plan to interview several other agencies to understand and characterise more interventions across the country.