28/10/2018
Punjab’s burning problem
Farmers in punjab continue to burn paddy stubble every winter despite a ban on the practice.About 200 km northwest of Patiala, in Amritsar — from where the monsoon winds recede earlier — the fields have already been harvested and readied for the winter crop. In Patiala, this step is still some time away, as the fires attest. Flaming carpets belch white smoke into the clear blue sky along this stretch of highway.
according to the Punjab Remote Sensing Centre, Ludhiana, which tracks such fires via satellites and reports them to the government. Punjab alone generates about 20 million tonnes of straw, three-quarters of which are burnt. Behind the generation of such a huge volume of chaff is the increasing popularity of combine harvesters. Farmers prefer these machines as it helps them save on the high labour costs of manual harvesting. But one advantage of manual harvesting is that the stalk which remains is extremely small and does not impede the sowing of fresh seed. But the machines leave stubble shavings that are 6-8 inches high, which if not cleared make fresh sowing impossible.
There are just two things needed for the quickest and the cheapest way to get rid of this stubble: diesel and a match box. Not surprisingly, setting the stubble on fire to prepare the fields for wheat has become a common practice in Punjab. Until a few decades ago, the straw generated by the machines was manageable. They could be sold to the packaging industry and also turned into mulch within the field through the natural, slow process of organic decomposition. Now, however, with about 20 million tonnes of straw generated in the State, and barely two to three weeks to dispose them of and prepare the fields for the next crop, cost-conscious farmers are left with few options other than burning the whole lot.
Are machines the answer?
Earlier this year, the Union Agriculture Ministry earmarked Rs. 591 crore for disbursal to Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh, the idea being to help farmers access these machines. Individual farmers could buy them at half their retail price; if bought through self-help groups, they got an 80% discount. In Bibipur, Singh and nine other farmers got together and formed such a group. The cost price of the equipment in the Bibipur council office yard is Rs. 10 lakh, but thanks to the government scheme, a farmer and his associates bought it for Rs. 2 lakh.
“Using farm equipment is only slightly costlier than burning the field and it helps preserve the environment as well as the health of farmers.”
In Punjab and Haryana, there are restrictions in place on how much groundwater could be drawn, as farmers in these States like to flood their fields to sow the rice crop. This, , has further narrowed the window to a mere two-three weeks for clearing out the rice stubble, forcing some farmers to burn away the stubble.
The government line
But officials from the PPCB insist that enforcement of the stubble-burning ban has been stepped up, and so far, there have been fewer fires this year when compared to the same time frame last year.
Now the crop residue is also being used for seven biomass-based power projects with a combined capacity of 62.5 MW .The government is educating farmers that burning the soil also destroys the soil nutrients and increases their fertilizer requirement. For this they have run advertisements. Using farm equipment is only slightly costlier, just Rs. 300 more per acre, than burning the field, and it helps preserve the environment as well as their health.
Apart from efforts to motivate farmers to sell their field residue to power generation companies, the administration is also trying to build a narrative on how stubble-burning damages the soil.
Pointing out that mechanisation is not the sole answer to the problem of stubble burning, Umendra Dutt of Kheti Virasat Mission, an organisation promoting organic farming, says that “mechanisation is only a partial solution, since most of these machines would be used for just a month and lie idle for the rest of the year. Instead, farmers should be motivated to diversify their crops, focussing on domestic diversification and not just commercial diversification.”
While studies over the years have established that pollutants can travel great distances and survive in the atmosphere for a long time, the contribution of Punjab’s stubble-burning to Delhi’s winter smog has not been precisely determined. A Harvard University study published in March 2018 said that “7-78%” of PM2.5 pollution in Delhi is due to “agricultural fires”.
Sachchida Nand Tripathi, a professor at the Indian Institute of Technology Kanpur and an expert on air pollution, says
“Stubble burning does play a role, but our recent studies show that 60% of Delhi’s pollution is due to a wide range of sources within Delhi NCR, such as industries, coal burning, and vehicular emissions. Efforts should be made to address them too.”