NATIONAL MISSION FOR SUSTAINABLE AGRICULTURE (NMSA)

The NMSA, launched in 2011–12, aims at enhancing food security and protection of resources such as land, water, biodiversity and genetic resources by developing strateg ies to make Indian agriculture more resilient to climate change.53 The Economic Survey 2011–12 discusses the Impacts of Climate Change on Indian Agriculture in the following points:

(i) Indian agriculture, with two-third rainfed area remains vulnerable to various vagaries of monsoon, besides facing occurrence of drought and flood in many parts of the country. Natural calamities such as drought and flood occur frequently in many parts of the country.

(ii) Climate change will aggravate these risks and may considerably affect food security through direct and indirect effects on crops, soils, livestock, fisheries and pests. Building climate resilience, therefore, is critical.

(a) Potential adaptation strategies to deal with the adverse impacts of climate change are :

(b) Developing cultivars tolerant to heat, moisture and salinity stresses;

(c) Modifying crop management practices; improving water management;

(d) Adopting new farm practices such as resource-conserving technologies;

(e) Crop diversification; improving pest management;

(f) Making available timely weather-based advisories;

(g) Crop insurance; and harnessing the indigenous technical knowledge of farmers.

The Indian Council of Agricultural Research has initiated a scheme on National Initiative on Climate Resilient Agriculture (NICRA). The initiative has been planned as a multi-disciplinary, multi-institutional effort covering crops, livestock and fisheries, and focusing mainly on adaptation and mitigation of climate change in agriculture. It also has a component for demonstration of climate-coping technologies on farmers’ fields in 100 most vulnerable districts. State-of-the-art infrastructure is being set up at key research institutes to undertake frontier research on climate change adaptation and mitigation.