Food security: What it takes to make it real

The ongoing debate on right to food intensified with the Sonia Gandhi-led National Advisory Council (NAC) clearing a draft food security bill last month. The bill is all set to be introduced in the monsoon session of Parliament. No doubt, it will be a historic moment for India if parliament approves it.

However, the main questions are whether we will be able to sustain agricultural production and ensure steady supply of food with our present approach towards natural resources and with the little or scattered investment earmarked for its conservation? And, will conventional agricultural production systems, which functions in an exploitative framework, with heavy dependence on chemical inputs, deliver? The questions assume even more relevance as the Planning Commission is about to finalise the approach paper for the 12th Five Year Plan, and different working groups are engaged in intense deliberations to propose an agriculture agenda for the next five years.

Addressing the problem

A Planning Commission working group on natural resource management (NRM) in agriculture constituted for the 11th Plan five years ago, has done a threadbare analysis of the issue and recommended solutions. Five years down the line, we are still struggling with the crisis and the situation is getting even worse.

Even as we talk about NRM in agriculture, it seems we are glued to the production-oriented mindset, yield being the single indicator of success and hence focus is always on improving input (water, fertilizer etc) use efficiencies. But what we continue to forget is that we are working in a complex system where we cannot separate environmental interactions, energy transformations and socio-economic factors from agriculture research and development.

So if we don’t change our approach and adopt a holistic outlook we will be able to neither improve efficiency of our farming systems nor sustain production.
For explaining the concept further, let us take the case of soil health crisis.

It is an accepted fact that soil is fast degrading and as a result our food security is under threat. Our policy experts and scientists approach the issue in a very reductionist way trying to solve the crisis through correcting chemical imbalances, and tackling micronutrient deficiencies. But what they forget is that soil is a living ecosystem with its own biological, physical and chemical properties and overall improvement of soil health can only solve the crisis.

This is possible through interventions, including generation and addition of biomass and promotion of other ecological practices. Labour is a major limiting factor for biomass generation and use. Government support systems and incentives are either minimal or scattered. On the other hand, resource degrading subsidies continue to promote indiscriminate use of chemical fertilisers. Herbicides and insecticides also wreck havoc on the soil biota.

Socio-economic factors also play a critical role. At the farming systems level, different sectors compete for whatever little biomass is available. Green biomass is needed as fodder for cattle, cowdung cakes are used as cooking fuels, biomass is also used for energy production, and finally biomass for soil health improvement. So it’s very important to have a strategy to find synergy between these functions. A better understanding of farmers’ perception of the issue, their practical constraints, their thought process and their traditional knowledge is essential to chalk out a successful policy for addressing the issue.

Agroecology is both a science and a practice and hence participation of stakeholders at all stages from research to implementation and interdisciplinary approaches are the essence of this framework. It is exactly opposite to the present practice of developing technologies in isolation and then testing its impact on environment and socio-economy.

A change in approach to translate into meaningful actions should be accompanied with shift in investments and changes in institutional mandates. We need to look at options to gradually shift subsidies allocated to chemical fertilisers to investments in building rural institutions and infrastructure for agroecological inclusive development.

The existing institutions at different levels should take up new roles to facilitate change. At the grassroots new institutions needs to be created to enable free flow of knowledge and information both ways.

(The writer is with Greenpeace India)