HP Aims to Expand Natural Farming by Adding 30,000 Acres to its Land

Rakesh Kanwar, the secretary of agriculture in Himachal Pradesh, gave the Prakritik Kheti Khushhal Kisan Yojana (PK3Y) authorities instructions to work with farmers in order to expand the area ideal for natural farming prior to the Kharif season.

According to him, this should largely apply to the 1.59 lakh farmers in the state who are now engaged in natural farming. Up to this point, the state has around 50,000 acres altogether under natural farming. In 2023–2024, it is intended to bring an additional 30,000 acres to natural farming.

Kanwar, who was in charge of the scheme's review meeting, instructed the authorities to contact the farmers with a millet production plan for the kharif season and instructed them to make all required preparations, including the timely availability of millets seeds available to the farmers.

According to him, officials need to set up regular interactions between experienced farmers and new farmers so that the latter may learn about natural agricultural practices.

He suggested that authorities from the Agricultural Technology Management Agency find certain regions where residents are eager to switch to natural farming on their own and devise a plan to recognize those areas as natural villages, panchayats, or at any other level.

The initiative, according to the secretary, should be designed to evaluate the production of natural apples so that it may be effectively publicized in advance to assess consumer interest. This would strengthen the natural product’s marketing linkages.

According to Naresh Thakur, the state project director, around 52,000 farmers have been granted natural product certification using a self-certification methodology developed under PK3Y. He stated that the goal was to certify all of the existing farmers, mentioned an English news portal.

Thakur urged the officials to devise a method so that the NGOs or farmer-producer organizations can also be brought under certification for agriculture and horticulture yield. "For better marketing," he stated, "a mechanism should also be there to certify the processed products such as ghee of a desi cow, fruit jam, etc."

Project managers from the Agricultural Technology Management Agency from several districts as well as representatives from the Shimla-based state project implementation unit of the Prakritik Kheti Yojana attended the review meeting.