Eminent speakers shared their expert knowledge to lead India towards achieving SDGs and total food security before the dawn of the year 2030
World Food Trust (WFP) recently organised a day-long seminar on ‘Sustainable Agriculture and India towards Total Food Security’ in Delhi. The seminar saw active participation from the Central and state governments, academicians, and representatives from the NGOs, foreign embassies and the private sector. Eminent speakers joined the discussions and shared their expert knowledge with the audience for a result-oriented approach to lead India towards achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and total food security before the dawn of the year 2030.
Dr Ashok Dalwai, CEO, National Rain Fed Area Authority, in his opening remarks, explained the trends, opportunities, and challenges to overcome and achieve sustainability goals. He said, “In India, many people are suffering from malnutrition, vitamin and mineral deficiency. With the help of science, we can develop varieties that give us food and nutrition. These fortified varieties not just contain the basic carbohydrates but contain more iron and all other kinds of nutrients that are required.”
G Ashok Kumar, Additional Secretary, with the Government of India and Mission Director, National Water Mission, highlighted the importance of water in agriculture and elaborated the meaning of Sahi Fasal. Elaborating further, he said, “Sahi Fasal campaign was launched to nudge farmers in the water-stressed areas to grow crops that are not water-intensive but use water efficiently; for healthy, nutritious and economically remunerative crop which is also environmentally friendly. We are creating awareness among farmers on appropriate crops, micro-irrigation, soil moisture conservation, and crop diversification, such as weaning them away from water-intensive crops like paddy and sugarcane to crops like corn and maize that require less water.”
Vivek Arora, Principal lead FFRC, Food Safety and Standards Organisation of India (FSSAI), enlightened the audience with FSSAI’s Eat Right Initiative, its key functions and elaborated on the importance of Eat Safe, Eat Healthy and Eat Sustainable. He also stressed that to conserve the environment there is a need to bring in more technologies to improve efficiencies in agricultural practices.
Rajiv Ranjan Mishra, DG, National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG), made a brief presentation on water resources management in the Ganges. According to him, the future of sustainable agriculture or food security is not possible without water.
Sampath Kumar, CEO, Meghalaya Basin Development Authority (MBDA), presented a case study to explain the authority’s significant activities and the work done so far to conserve water and increase sustainability in agriculture. According to him, MBDA pays special attention to water conservation and its optimum management.
In a virtual presentation, T Vijay Kumar, Executive Vice Chairman, Rythu Sadhikara Samstha (Andhra Government’s Corporation for farmer’s empowerment) elaborated on three main issues – farmers’ livelihoods, human health, and planetary health lessons. According to him, sustainable agriculture is the agriculture of the future. He added, “Government of AP had a vision that all farmers gradually transit from the conventional agriculture to sustainable or climate-resilient agriculture or natural farming. We have multiple emergencies; on one side, we have farmers’ distress which is made worst by climate change. Farmers are the frontline soldiers facing climate change, and the highest risk in their livelihood comes from climate change. Moreover, the current agriculture system is continuously increasing their cost of cultivation.”
SM Husain, Former Chairman, Central Water Mission, emphasised the optimum management of water resources in his presentation. Husain rued over the fact that India has gone down on Food Security Index and supported the Call for Action by the World Food Trust to initiate multi-pronged action on the ground by all stakeholders, in a combined manner, as the need of the hour.
Ashish Kumar Bhutani, State Project Director, Assam Rural Infrastructure and Agricultural Services (ARIAS) mentioned that the state of Assam had strengthened its cluster-based production approaches.
Dr Chindi Vasudevappa, VC-NIFTEM, explained the role of NIFTEM in preparing the much-needed workforce, “We are working for the industry and are trained to build in capacity, critical manpower that can address the needs of the industry, especially in food processing. Moreover, our curriculum is designed in a way that addresses the needs of the post-harvest and food processing industry.”
The full-day conference also included presentations of Suneeti Toteja, Scientist-E, Standardisation Head, Food and Agriculture at the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS), where she briefed on BIS and the major activities of the standards.
Alok Adholeya, former Program Director, Sustainable Agriculture, TERI and presently the Visiting Professor at ICRIER, enlightened the audience on seed coating of microbes to reduce post-harvest losses, enhanced productivity, and carbon sequestration potential.
Arvind Kumar, Governor, World Water Council, and Founder President – India Water Foundation delivered a virtual presentation on enabling business in agriculture via ecosystem-based adaptation for sustainable food security.
In addition, the seminar also included presentations from few foreign missions in India. These included a presentation by Dalci de Jesus Bagolin, Agriculture Attache, Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Food Supply at the Embassy of Brazil in New Delhi and Yaroslav Kolensnik, Secretary at the Embassy of the Republic of Belarus in New Delhi.
Eminent speakers shared their expert knowledge to
