Re-imagining Agriculture

 Suman Sahai

Gene Campaign has been working in Uttarakhand for about 20 years on issues related to agriculture, food and nutrition. In this period I have seen significant changes among the people, especially the youth. The aspirations of the younger generation with respect to what they want from life are changing so rapidly that people of the older generation are most often not aware of what their children want. Indeed this is true across the country , especially in rural areas where agriculture remains the mainstay but where there is a growing disconnect from it. This is not new. Several studies show farmers are increasingly disenchanted with farming and would move out of it if they had a chance. One study found that 48 % that is roughly half the farming community did not want the next generation to take up farming.

The policy makers and scientists have not, however, synchronized their planning with the aspirations of either the farming community or the young people living in rural areas. Let me start with the dominant narrative in the food and agriculture sector.

We are still talking the language of ‘food security’ and nutrition security’ . Granted that the latter remains a challenge of serious dimension but in my many conversations with young farmers in Uttarakhand , Jharkhand, UP, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh and occasionally other states reveals one common theme. 

Young people want cash incomes so change the focus and the discourse from ‘food security’ to ‘ generating cash incomes from the farm’. The younger rural youth perceives agriculture as a mug’s game. I have often heard the farmers’ sons say “ Babu you do the farming, I am off to the city where I will at least get a steady income”. In a consumerist society and with the onslaught of  mindless television programs and worse, advertisements, the young people do not want to associate with agriculture.

But this can change if agriculture starts generating cash incomes that can buy them  the kinds of things they aspire to, a powerful motorcycle, a bigger television set, fashionable clothes and shoes, visits to the city, holidays and so on.

So my suggestion is, make the focus surplus cash rather than food security alone. Change the perception about agriculture. In today’s world, perception is king !!

In the television promotions on national channels, stop showing the farmer in a dhoti with a plough upon his shoulder, crushed with misery with three lines of frowns upon his forehead. Or  looking bleakly up to the sky waiting for the rain to come as he sits on parched earth which is cracked from the drought. That is not an image the youth ( or anyone else) wants to  identify with.  Show the farmer as a smart young man or woman taking  produce to the market, processing fruit into attractive bottles of juice and jams,  operating a unit making parboiled rice and packing it into attractive packages, making chips out of potatoes, sauce out of tomatoes, biscuits out of flour. Show that agriculture makes money.

Take a cue from the advertising that the defence sector does. When they invite people to join the army, airforce or navy.  A smart young man in his blue- gray overalls, carrying his helmet is shown in the backdrop of a fighter plane. The army is represented by fit young men in spit and polish, looking ready to take on any enemy to defend the  country. A woman in uniform is marching at the Republic Day Parade leading a contingent.  These are powerful, and attractive  images. The airforce doesn’t put up  images of mangled, crashed MiGs nor does the army put up pictures of bloodied, shot up soldiers.

Then why do we persist in showing a miserable broken farmer unable to feed his family, broken by the adversities of his life. Adversity is as much part of his life as crashed planes and sunken ships belong to a career in the airforce and navy. But is that what you want to project as all that the defence sector offers? 

Agricultural fields in Himalaya Photo courtesy: Ayush Joshi

In Gene Campaign’s  work in Uttarakhand, we have begun to talk about the great possibilities that the farm, orchard and livestock offers to make money and lead good lives. We have started training programs in value addition of fruits, vegetables  and traditional grains. We have had experts come and give training and demonstrations in increasing the production and productivity of crops. We also talk to farmers about the value of healthy, clean produce if they want their products to reach the market and get a good price. We are introducing the concept of standards and the importance of meeting  those standards if they want to make their products viable and competitive in the market.

We work principally with women farmers and we have organised them into Mahila Kissan Samitis (MKS).  Here in Uttarkhand,  as in most hill states, the women do most of the agricultural work so we figured they should claim the identify too. We have provided access to government schemes and programs, specially those related to agriculture and horticulture thus enabling them to apply in time and follow up their applications.

There has been a noticeable improvement in self confidence and a sense of empowerment. At a MKS sammelan attended by government officials like block officers, agriculture development officials, bank managers , horticulture department etc, we were delighted to see the women being assertive, taking on the officials about government schemes not reaching them and being monopolised by a few.

On the other hand, to build skills and capacity for income generation,  the women have received training in value addition of fruits , millets and traditional grains. Also in hygienic processing, standardisation, packaging and marketing. On the financial side they have been trained in the pricing of products, accounts and book keeping. Many of them have started earning from the sale of rhododendron and fruit products. They have also increased the consumption of millets in different forms at home which will hopefully lead to a better nutritional status over time.

Source:https://savekumaon.com/agriculture/ 

Millets Will Solve Problems

 As a large section of India is now aware, 2023 has been declared the Year of Millets by the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (UN FAO). The highlighting of millets on the global platform was mooted by MS Swaminathan some years ago, to focus attention on the importance of these highly nutritious grains which had ceded agricultural space to wheat and rice and fallen by the wayside after the Green Revolution. Ever since the UN FAO declaration, campuses across India are holding programs on millets. Every agriculture research station is conducting awareness programs, the better ones are doing exhibitions and demonstrations. How sorely such awareness programs are needed is seen in the near blank responses of the majority of visitors when asked what they knew about millets. Nothing. 

Why are millets important, one might ask. India is home to the largest number of hungry people in the world and sits near the bottom on the list of countries facing high levels of malnutrition. India also , like many countries in the tropical zone, is going to bear the worst brunt of climate change. This means a rocky agriculture scenario with unstable food production. Wheat, North India’s main Rabi (winter) crop is anticipated to suffer significant declines in production as temperatures rise with global warming. This becomes exceedingly critical since wheat along with rice, is the mainstay of India’s buffer stocks and its subsidized food programs. These are the Public Distribution System (PDS), the Mid Day Meal Scheme in schools, The ICDS ( Integrated Child Development Services Scheme) as well as the Annapurna and Antodaya food schemes. 

Millets can play a major role in addressing these challenges to India’s food and nutrition security. That’s because millets are hardy crops with a wide adaptation window which allows them to grow in diverse agro-ecological zones. They grow in high altitudes, in low altitudes like the plains of India and almost everywhere else. They need little water and have high temperature tolerance. 

On top of all this, the photosynthesis system of millets is more efficient than that of wheat and rice. In scientific jargon, millets are C4 crops whereas rice and wheat are C3 crops. C4 crops have a higher water use efficiency and are productive in climatic conditions that are hot and dry. C3 crops on the other hand, suffer under hot and dry conditions and lose productivity. That is the reason, millets will perform well under the hot and water stressed conditions brought about by climate change and will hence stabilise food production better than wheat and rice. So much for the production of food grains. 

The other stellar role that millets can play is in alleviating malnutrition. This is especially relevant for states like Uttarakhand which show appalling figures for malnutrition. Millets are nutrition bombs that are loaded with vitamins and minerals like calcium, iron, magnesium, manganese and several others. Finger millet, also called ragi and madua is loaded with calcium. Barnyard millet called sawa in UP and Bihar and madira in Uttarakhand, is a powerhouse of iron. These micronutrients are the key to good health and their deficiency is the main cause of under nutrition and malnutrition. Mainstreaming millets and incorporating them in family diets will go a long way in helping to improve the nutritional status of our poor. But to get there, a lot of work needs to be done.

Source: https://savekumaon.com/millets/

GM Crops – Relevance for Indian Agriculture

Dr Suman Sahai is a scientist trained in genetics and Founder Chairperson of the research and advocacy organization, Gene Campaign

What are GM crops and are they really what we need ? Are they safe to eat and are they also safe for the environment ? First it was Bt cotton, then there was the controversy over Bt brinjal. Most recently we have been discussing whether GM mustard has anything to offer India. All these are genetically modified crops to which there is both strong opposition as well as strong support, the latter largely from the biotech industry and a section of the scientific community.

GM crops are those crops in which a “foreign” gene has been introduced. In the case of Bt crops , it is a gene from a bacterium. In GM mustard, there are also bacterial genes but  different ones. There is substantial evidence that these crops can in some cases be unsafe for both people and the environment but this is contested by the biotech industry which puts out its own data.

So how do we go forward? I mention below some aspects that should inform any decisions taken with respect to this technology.

• New agricultural technologies in India must be introduced only if they can be successfully adopted by small farmers which constitute the bulk of the farming community in India. 

• Genetic engineering and GM crops are a privately owned technology unlike the Green Revolution which was a publicly owned technology. Agbiotech is largely owned by multinational corporations that are constantly undergoing changes and mergers but the players remain essentially the same: Monsanto, Syngenta, Dow, DuPont, Bayer Life Sciences and BASF. They control all upstream and downstream products and processes related to genetic engineering through a series of patents. 

• Countries like India can engage in Agbiotechnology only by licensing genes and research processes from the corporations. This means the technology will remain alien for the foreseeable future unless we embark on a flurry of innovations, signs of which are regrettably not visible so far.

• This also means that the private sector is creating private goods for which it charges very high rates. The case in the Supreme Court against Monsanto on the overpricing of its Bt cotton is a case in point. 

• Apart from the implications of technology dependence in a critical sector like food, the research agenda gets determined by the technology available. At the moment there are only two genes on offer from the corporations, the toxin gene from the bacterium Bacillus thuriengensis (Bt) and the genes that confer herbicide tolerance. Neither is of great relevance to the problems of Indian agriculture, yet over 40 % of the agbiotech research being done in India is based on the Bt gene. 

• If India wants to use Agbiotech, it must set its own research agenda, engage in novel gene discovery and use genes discovered in its labs to solve its agricultural problems. It should encourage South- South research partnerships rather than depend on multinational technology. Countries like Cuba, S Korea and Egypt can join India to form a South Technology Core. 

• Genetic engineering which is a regulated technology the world over requires careful monitoring and oversight and a stringent regulatory system to detect harmful developments in time. Otherwise GM crops can cause serious damage to the environment and to human and animal health. 

• The genetic variability in Indian agriculture is one of the richest and most varied in the world. Because of this, it forms an important bedrock of global food security.  India must be particularly careful that foreign genes do not contaminate native biodiversity and result in adverse impacts on such a valuable global resource. 

• The international biosafety convention, the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety recognizes the dangers posed by genetic engineering and lays down the Precautionary Principle as the basis of using GM crops. India does not follow the Precautionary Principle though. India is a center of origin for rice , that is , it is the birthplace of rice. Other such centers of origin, like Mexico (corn) , has banned GM corn; Peru (potato) has banned GM potato and China (soybean) has banned GM soybean but India promotes development of GM rice. 

• The Indian regulatory system is not yet stringent enough, transparent or inclusive of public views so the chances of damaging lapses occurring are high. If India wants to adopt GM crops, it should do so only after it has set up strong regulatory systems and taught its farmers the pros and cons of using Agbiotechnology. Studies have found that over 95 % percent of the farmers who cultivate Bt cotton have no idea what it is, what the stipulated procedures for cultivation are, why these are important and what will go wrong if these are not followed.

• A Citizens Commission on Agbiotechnology consisting of independent experts from various fields should be set up to advise the government on which agricultural technologies might be suitable for Indian farmers and to monitor their adoption and impact. 

Source: https://savekumaon.com/gm-crops/

India lacks GM regulation

You are one of the petitioners in the Supreme Court against GM crops. What prompted you to file the petition?

Gene Campaign (GC) organised a national conference on the Relevance of GM Technology to India Agriculture in 2003 with all possible stakeholders, including industry, civil society groups, academics, government officials, etc., broadly representing all shades of opinions. The Department of Biotechnology (DBT) rebutted every single recommendation, saying none of these were needed. We then had no choice but to approach the Supreme Court with a writ petition. 

 

The government claims it found no negative impact on animals and plant. Is this correct?

The government has not provided data on biosafety tests despite requests and questions sent under the RTI. For instance, the Gene Campaign had asked for the biosafety data on Bt brinjal when it was coming up for possible release but this was not provided. That’s just one instance. Right from the beginning, the government refused to engage in open discussions. This has not helped find a solution.

When GM technology is accepted in the US, why is there so much protest in India?

GM technology is only the beginning. We have many transformative technologies in the pipeline, all with substantial potential for good as well as harm. We must develop stringent regulatory systems to minimise risk in these cases. Shoddy regulation can cause often irreversible damage. Let me also mention here that the US, which is one of the strongest proponents of GM technology, also has strong regulations, including a liability and redress law that ensures violators have to pay for damages and clean-ups and compensate for economic loss. India does not have these.

What is the problem with manipulating the genes of food crops to get the desired results?

Interfering in the genetic material can cause unnatural substances to be produced in the cell. These may be harmless or very harmful. That is why the scientists who developed this technology, themselves asked for a regulatory system that would test for unintended effects on the environment as well as human and animal health. There are enough examples of allergy-producing substances or toxic products produced by genetic engineering. Careful monitoring is therefore a must.

Have we achieved the intended goal with Bt cotton?

No. GM crops have been bred for high yield or higher productivity. The two most prevalent GM traits are Bt for pest resistance and HT (herbicide tolerance) for weed control. The Bt technology has failed as one can see from the Bt cotton experience. The bollworm pest has become resistant and secondary pests have become aggressive and dominant. Farmers are either moving away from cotton or are spraying heavily. The HT technology is a human and animal health disaster. The two weedicides in use with HT crops are glyphosate and as in the case of GM mustard with the undeclared HT trait, glufosinate. Glyphosate is linked to cancer and mental health issues among others. The link between cancer and glufosinate is not fully established but there is a report of induced tumors. It is clearly neurotoxic, produces cognitive decline and is toxic to animals and microbes. Its use in the soil will cause severe microbiological imbalance and a deterioration of soil health. Residues of both these dangerous weedicides are reported in food. As the evidence shows, it is reckless and dangerous in the extreme to adopt HT technology.

Source: The Indian Express, 16 Sept. 2023 ; https://www.newindianexpress.com/xplore/2023/sep/16/india-lacks-gm-regulation-dr-suman-sahai-2615286.html  

 

We must build a consensus on technologies which we need

Suman Sahai

Not just agriculture and food production, in any area where technology is involved, whether science and technology, is fraught with dispute.

The wrangling over GM mustard, which could become India’s first genetically engineered food crop if the government has its way, reveals the ongoing dispute in society on the suitability of GM crops. The earlier engagement with Bt brinjal and the government’s efforts to release it saw the same pros-and-cons discussions. Ultimately, Bt brinjal was not released as scientists were unable to answer the questions raised by opponents or provide safety data.

Not just agriculture and food production, in any area where technology is involved, whether science and technology, water management or land use, moving ahead is increasingly fraught with dispute. The ideas and development paradigm are under siege, with disparate viewpoints unable to find common ground. Policy formulation faces confrontational interactions rather than dialogue. Part of this stems from the old paternalistic formula for development that came from the top (meaning government), which was accepted till some years ago, is not acceptable any longer.

People aren’t willing to be placid consumers of a roadmap set by the powers that be, but are now informed by wider concerns about the environment, social equity and larger self-interest.Most new conflicts are arising in technologies and developments derived from or based on biology. Many are related to food, livelihood and ecological security. The 21st century is predicted to be that of biology, the time when fast-paced and radical breakthroughs will transform the science. Recent developments have led to transformative technologies like genetic engineering including Crispr, Nanotechnology, Stem Cell interventions, Genomics, Proteomics, Metabolomics.

The technology, with its associated features like knowledge creation, intellectual property rights and access to key resources like genetic resources, has raised a set of major controversies with deeply entrenched views on both sides of the divide.Part of the problem is increasing privatisation of science and the fruits of scientific research and resultant sequestering of information going into the private rather than public domain.

 

This is at variance with the hitherto strong traditions of publicly-funded science and technology development that was accessible to all. The Green Revolution, perhaps India’s most visible technology, or at least one with the widest impact, was a technology in the public domain, almost diametrically opposed to the current genetic engineering, a purely privately-owned technology.
In addition to increasing privatisation, there are concerns over the safety and ethical dimensions of the emerging transformative technologies like genetic engineering, nanotechnology and the “omics” range of genomics, proteomics, metabolomics, etc. All these will change the way that food production, healthcare and drug delivery will be managed in future and the ways in which the natural and human environment will be impacted.

 

Building consensus and finding common ground

Most discussions on genetic resources, genetic engineering and other transformative technologies are characterised by a culture of conflict and opposition, discouraging constructive dialogue between opposing viewpoints. There are few efforts to find consensus and commonality; rather there is escalating sharpness in divergence of views and suspicion among the key stakeholders about “hidden agendas”. In India, the lack of transparency on the part of government agencies, unwillingness to share biosafety data and the exclusion of major stakeholders in decision- making is becoming a major impediment to the adoption of technology.Not in India, but elsewhere in the world, there have been attempts to scale down differences and find common ground as a prelude to reaching some consensus on controversial issues. Conflict resolution structures have been set up in the past on the issues of Plant Genetic Resources (PGR) and Intellectual Property Rights (IPR), with varying degrees of success. In all cases though, the issue has moved forward from the original stalemate. IPR still remains a contentious issue but the concept of farmers’ rights has moved forward, with India playing a pioneering role.

The Keystone Dialogues hosted by the Keystone Centre in the United States are carefully constructed deliberations that address the politically controversial and technically complex aspects of an issue. Another example is the Crucible Group supported by the IDRC (International Development Research Centre) of Canada. This group was active in the field of Intellectual Property Rights associated with Plant Genetic Resources. The Crucible Group discussions produced rather divergent points of view on plant genetic resources but managed to develop a consensus on some issues like joint conservation efforts, including local communities and private companies, as well as sharing of gene bank collections with local communities.

A transparent dialogue process must be initiated to exchange data and build a consensus acceptable to public, private, and civil society sectors. Diverse interest groups must be at the table so that a wide range of inputs are available for decision-making. The creation of a consensus-seeking platform should try to resolve differences among the main protagonists/stakeholders as a first step, rather than seek immediate solutions. The consensus process should try to make opposing parties aware of the nuances of the other positions, even as they disagree. If this starts to happen, the first steps in moving away from the all-black or all- white positions can begin, leading to some agreed areas of action.

 India is poised for growth but is hamstrung by muddled, often ill-informed goals for technology adoption. It tends to fall prey to vested interests. The country needs to shake off its confusion and develop a clear line on which technologies are suited to its needs. The judicious adoption of technology can act as a motor for the country’s growth. But we have to develop a consensus on the kinds of technologies that are best suited for us and the manner in which we wish to proceed.

Source: https://www.asianage.com/opinion/columnists/240923/suman-sahai-we-must-build-a-consensus-on-technologies-which-we-need.html