Benefits of organic farming stressed

ORGANIC PRODUCE will constitute a major chunk of agro exports owing to its higher nutritional status coupled with zero level of pesticide residue. Indian Council of Agriculture Research (ICAR) Director-General Dr Mangla Rai said this at a brainstorming dialogue on organic agriculture at the Indian Institute of Sugarcane Research on Thursday.

ORGANIC PRODUCE will constitute a major chunk of agro exports owing to its higher nutritional status coupled with zero level of pesticide residue.

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Indian Council of Agriculture Research (ICAR) Director-General Dr Mangla Rai said this at a brainstorming dialogue on organic agriculture at the Indian Institute of Sugarcane Research on Thursday.

Deputy Director General (horticulture and crop sciences) Dr Gautam Kalloo, while outlining the objectives of the dialogue, advocated that switching over to organic farming in a partial mode could be a pragmatic proposition at this juncture as apprehensions of the farming community, particularly marginal and smaller ones, with regard to yield decline at present appears to be a major handicap in this form of agriculture.

Various eminent agricultural scientists who participated in the brainstorming dialogue were unanimous with respect to the enormous edge of organic agriculture vis-à-vis chemo-centric agriculture as it was economically workable, ecologically sustainable and offered a wider scope for inherent bio-remediation mechanism of soil in place through an array of beneficial microbes inhabiting the soil.