What comes to our mind when you hear the term agriculture?Ploughing fields, harvesting crops, and feeding livestock. What doesn’t cross our minds is that Agriculture is not just about the traditional roles related to farming and crops. Agriculture has grown tremendously in modern times, with cutting edge research and constant innovations and so has its scope. If you are interested to explore careers in the field of agriculture, read Krishi Jagran’s interview with Dr. Naleeni Ramawat, Director, Amity Institute of Organic Agriculture.
Dr Naleeni Ramawat has to her credit meritorious service of over 18 years in teaching, research and administration in agriculture crop production and management. She is a doctorate in agronomy with specialization in crop production and crop modeling. She has worked with CSIR institute Palampur, International Traceability systems in New Delhi and also worked as coordinator for organic projects with NAFED. Dr Naleeni has been working with Amity for last 14 years, developing and nurturing Amity Institute of Organic Agriculture.
What made you choose Agriculture as a profession? How did you develop interest in this field?
Agriculture was not as promising sector as it is now, while most students opted for medical or engineering as their career I was fascinated by various scientists who were working in the regional research institute near to the place I resided in my childhood. I got inspired by them as they were working on real life problems. Although I didn’t have a long term plan at that time, I just wanted to be like those scientists. And that is how I started off.
How do you feel when you see that agriculture has started becoming a preffered career choice among the youngsters today?
It feels good; India is an agrarian economy. More than 50% of the population still depends on agriculture as their primary occupation. A huge portion of Indian GDP is coming from the agriculture. Government of India started a few schemes like ARYA and RAFTAR to attract youth in rural areas to take up various agriculture, allied and service sector enterprises for sustainable income and gainful employment in selected districts. I have witnessed that the youth is well aware; While interviewing I have seen students that have clear objectives to choose agriculture as a career rather than other career options. Moreover, Government of India has declared BSc. Agriculture as a professional degree course. This has also helped attracting more students into this field.
What are the various career options in the field?
A plethora of opportunities lies for the people who looking for jobs in agriculture and allied fields right after Bsc agriculture. I would like to segregate all the career opportunities into 3 verticles. First, Marketing; all major agrochemical companies, seed companies are looking for Agriculture graduates to absorb them as management trainees, farm managers, agronomists. If a student wants a more enhanced career in Marketing, they can go for MBA in Agribusiness. MBA+ BSc Agriculture make a candidate ready for the Industry. Such a candidate has knowledge of production technology as well as Marketing. They can find positions as consultants, Business development managers etc.
Second, Research; if a student has aptitude for research, they can pursue post graduation followed by Ph.D to become scientists. There are more than 12 disciplines in which the student can opt for their Masters like soil science, plant pathology, Plant breeding etc.,
Banking sector, Agriculture is priority sector in India and Banks hire specialist Agriculture officers who have technical know- how of Agriculture.
Besides these students can become IFS officers through UPSC.
What are different Job profiles that a person can expect after BSc Agriculture?
Farm managers, Management Trainees, Agriculture journalist, Business development Managers are most prominent job profiles that a BSc.Agriculture Graduate can expect among many others.
Amity Institute of Organic Agriculture offers various programs at Graduate and Post graduate levels. Please elaborate about these.
Amity Institute of Organic Agriculture was started in 2005 under the dynamic vision of our founder president, Dr. Ashok K. Chauhan who has keen interest to develop this sector in India. We offer BSc Agriculture to any student from science background. We also offer Post Graduate and Doctoral programs. The admission to Bsc program has been shifted completely online. The students have to answer 3 questions and upload their videos which will be screened and the selected candidates will be notified. For Ph.D program the students will have to give an entrance test. For more information students can visit official website of Amity.
As a parting note, she said that the Agriculture is a very noble profession, which not only has endless career opportunities but also gives satisfaction & asked more and more youngsters to take up Agriculture as a career.