In News:

• The Punjab government has proposed the Air Quality Commission to provide a cash incentive of Rs 2,500 per acre to farmers for not burning stubble.

What’s in Today’s Article

• Stubble Burning – Reasons for its prevalence, Major States practicing it, Impact of stubble burning, efforts to address the issue, suggestions
• News Summary

Why Farmers opt for Stubble Burning?

• Rice and wheat straws left in the field, after combine harvesting, are generally burnt by the farmers to facilitate seed bed preparation and seeding.
• Farmers find this method as quick and cheap compared to other practices for crop residue management.
• Since input costs of farming is going up day by day, farmers are not willing to further invest in equipments useful for crop residue management.
  • Happy Seeder (a tractor-operated machine for in-situ management of paddy stubble) continues to be an expensive method for majority of farmers.

Areas where this practice is rampant

• Burning of agricultural residue is done on a large-scale basis in states such as Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and National Capital Region of Delhi.
• This is prevalent in other states too. This includes: Bihar, Odisha, West Bengal etc.

Impact Of Agriculture Fire

• Environmental Pollution
  • Pollutants from these fires spread across the region, triggering smog and extreme air quality situations.
  • An increase in the concentration of particulate matter (PM) 2.5 and PM 10 in the atmosphere is observed in north India in October-November
• Harmful to the health of soil
  • Burning of crop residues removes huge amount of nutrient & organic carbon content from the soil.

Steps Taken by the government to tackle this issue

• Taken by Centre
  • A Central Sector Scheme on ‘Promotion of Agricultural Mechanisation for In-Situ Management of Crop Residue in the States of Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and NCT of Delhi’ was approved for the period from 2018-19 to 2019-20. This Scheme was further extended
  • Farmers are being provided 50% of the cost of machinery/equipment as financial assistance for the purchase of such machinery.
  • Over the last 3 years, the Centre has been heavily subsidizing various agriculture machines.
  • Profit from the left-over biomass is shared with farmers.
• Pusa Decomposer by Indian Agricultural research Institute (IARI)
  • The Pusa decomposer is a bio-enzyme developed by the IARI to decompose crop residue.
  • It decomposes stubble within 20-25 days after spraying and turn it into manure, improving the soil quality.
• Taken by State Governments and Other agencies
  • Sensitising farmers on healthier practices.
  • Recently Punjab government decided to give incentives to industries which install paddy-straw-fired boilers.
  • It also decided to provide non-fiscal incentives to these industries in terms of availability of Panchayat land for storage of paddy straw with lease agreement upto 33 years.

Way Forward:

• Creation of markets for crop residue-based briquettes (a compressed block of coal dust or other combustible biomass material).
• Nearby thermal power plants must mandatorily undertake co-firing of crop residues with coal.
• A special credit line should be established for financing farm equipment and working capital for private sector participation.
• Alternate beneficial use of crop residues must be promoted.
  • These include: compost production, bioenergy production, biochar production, in pulp and paper industry etc.
• There is a huge potential to convert crop residues and food/ plant wastes into bio-fuel. Government should start incentivising such

News Summary

• As per the proposal sent to Air Quality Commission, the farmers will be provided cash incentive of Rs 2,500 per acre for not burning their paddy stubble. They are free to use technology of their choice.
• Punjab government will give Rs 500, the Delhi government will give Rs 500 and the Central government will give Rs 1,500.
• This proposal will be implemented only after it gets the approval from the Air Quality Commission.