KVM farmers use Jeeva-amrita (a cow urine based microbial preparation) to revive microbial activity in soil. With the application of Jeeva-amrita and Ghan Jeeva-amrita (a solid form of Jeeva-amrita), the soil is gradually becoming rich in the humus, yield has increased, and other life forms are coming back in the fields, says Charanjeet Singh Punni, another KVM farmer from Chaina village and a natural farming trainer. Punni highlights another aspect of natural farming. “Although the sunlight is essential for the photosynthesis, it is a threat to the soil bacteria. Mulching is the best answer to this.”
Mulching is an essential part of natural farming. Natural farmers agree that when the soil is covered with various forms of mulching, the results are unimaginably good. Krishnan Jakhar of village Dhaba (near Dabawali), Vinod Jyani of village Katehra, near Fazilka, Swarn Singh of Karamgarh Shattran, Madan Lal of Bullowal in Hoshiarpur, Jarnail Singh in Meharu, Nakodar and other natural farmers of the KVM network are using inter crops, plant residue, fallen leaves, bushes, weeds and sometimes even the wheat straw or the paddy straw cuttings spread in the fields to cover the naked soil. “Besides protecting the bacteria and retaining the moisture, this also keeps the temperature of the soil low and it never goes beyond 40 degrees Celsius, which is the upper limit for the survival of microbes,” tells Ajay Tripathi, associate director of KVM.
But do the economics of natural farming work? After adopting natural farming, the farmers claim they are spending far less than earlier chemical farming days. Natural farming is more cost effective and input efficient, says Amarjeet Dhillon, a small farmer from Dabrikhana village, who owns only two acres of land. For example, farmers who have sugarcane and black gram in their farms have to spend virtually nothing on inputs. He cites several examples where farmers had to spend only 100-200 rupees on inputs for one acre as against 3000 rupees by a farmer using chemicals.
On an average in Malwa’s cotton belt, farmers are spending 7000 rupees on chemical inputs per acre annually in normal conditions. If there are more pest attacks, then there may be no limits. A rough estimate is that every village is spending a large sum of money, from 4 million rupees to 60 million rupees, purchasing agro-chemicals, depending upon the area of cultivation and cropping pattern. Natural farmers want to stop the loss of village wealth by bringing down farmers’ spending on agro-chemicals.
“This is the Kisan (farmer) version of Swadeshi – the economic self-sufficiency movement of India’s independence struggles,” says Chamkour Singh of Dhudhike village of Moga district. Dhudhike is famous for being the birthplace of one of India’s most well-known freedom fighters, Lala Lajpat Rai. “Our farmers are no more going to serve MNCs or big agro-chemical corporations. We are evolving a framework for an agricultural Swadeshi movement in Punjab. We are going to redefine Swadeshi in the present context. That is why KVM has given a slogan to its farmers – MNCs quit our farms,” he adds.
The KVM’s natural farming movement has brought another change in the mindset of farmers there. They have stopped looking towards the Punjab Agriculture University or departmental experts for expert advice. “We feel that every farmer of ours is an expert in himself, he practices this science of natural farming, he lives natural farming every day, he is totally engulfed with the philosophy of natural farming,” says Dr Harminder Sidhu, a Homeopath practitioner and a practicing natural farmer from village Jalaldiwal of Raikot in Ludhiana district. “The modern agriculture paradigm has limited all expertise to Agriculture Universities. The chemicalised agriculture model has made farmers scientifically illiterate. It is a conspiracy which has made farmers dependent on universities, department, companies and even pesticide retailers. It is a cruel joke that those who get a three or five year degree in agriculture with an alien kind of agriculture knowledge are known as experts, whereas the farmers who inherited agriculture wisdom for hundreds, if not thousands of years are supposed to be ignorant about farming.”
“We are not going to accept this nonsense any more. We are working to build self-confidence in our farmers’ own agricultural heritage and wisdom,” adds a confident Dr Sidhu.
Still, the government is unfazed by the grassroots movement and is in the midst of a discussion about introducing GM eggplant and GM okra.
Janaki Bahadur is a Delhi, India Based Correspondent.
Reddit
Digg
StumbleUpon
Delicious
Technorati
Yahoo
Google
Plurk
