Paramparagat Krishi Vikas Yojana

Paramparagat Krishi Vikas Yojana (PKVY) is a comprehensive centrally sponsored scheme, launched in April, 2015 to transform India towards a chemical free organic country. The scheme is aligned with the goals of National Programme for Organic Production. The scheme aims to bring about successful “Organic Farming Revolution” in India and also achieve the target of covering 50,000 hectares under organic farming in the North Eastern states.

• The scheme has the objectives like - fifty or more farmers will form a cluster having 50 acre land to take up organic farming; 10,000 clusters to be formed covering 5.0 lakh acre area under organic farming; every farmer will be provided Rs. 20,000 per acre in three years for seed to harvesting of crops and to transport produce to the market and improve and control the certification system to ensure greater export of organic products and promote the use of organic inputs like vermin-compost, bio-fertilizers, city compost etc. to reduce the input costs.

Performance of the scheme

• Shifting focus towards value chain production, processing, marketing and support agencies.
• Marketing and brand building initiative by Farmer Producer Organizations (FPOs)
• Government subsidies for functional infrastructure like collection, aggregation, grading units and North Eastern organic bazaar.
• Initiate the Organic Value Chain Development for North Eastern Region and in hilly and tribal areas.

Challenges

• Indiscriminate use of fertilizers by farmers in agriculture to increase yields.
• Soil system takes time to respond to organic production system.
• Over reliance on purchase of organic inputs from outside the farm has been found to increase the cost of production (by 15-20%).
• Lack of organic certification through independent third parties.
• Lack of culture of hand holding of entrepreneurs and access to timely formal credit.

Ways to Improve

• Provide financial assistance to Farmer Producer Companies (FPCs)
• Promoting on-farm generation of inputs to reduce the cost of production per unit area (by 13%) in organic farming.
• Promotion of Integrated Organic Farming System (IOFS) models to meet 70-80% of organic inputs.
• Ensure cluster development for post-harvest collection and aggregation, value addition and processing facilities under the Farmer Producer Organizations (FPOs).
• Create forward and backward linkages connecting growers of organic produce with consumers.