Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday asked farmers to engage in organic and diverse farming to maintain soil fertility even as he pointed out that the increasing use of ethanol is having a better impact on the environment and the lives of farmers.
The Prime Minister said that the Government has resolved to meet the target of 20 percent ethanol blending in petrol by 2025. Previously, the resolve was to achieve the target by 2030 which is now preponed by 5 years.
Modi said that a large part of this eight-fold increase in ethanol procurement has benefitted the sugarcane farmers of the country but ethanol production is now being diversified.
Addressing the World Environment Day event, jointly organized by the Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas and the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change through a video conference, the Prime Minister said that farmers should focus on diverse farming to save “mother earth”.
Modi interacted with a farmer from Pune who shared his experience of organic farming and use of biofuel in agriculture.
Modi released the “Report of the Expert Committee on Road Map for ethanol blending in India 2020-2025” and launched the ambitious E-100 pilot project in Pune for the production and distribution of ethanol across the country. The theme for this year’s event is ‘promotion of biofuels for a better environment’.
Union Cabinet Ministers Nitin Gadkari, Narendra Singh Tomar, Prakash Javadekar, Piyush Goyal and Dharmendra Pradhan attended the event.
The PM said India has taken another leap by releasing a detailed roadmap for the development of the ethanol sector on the occasion of World Environment Day. Till 2014, on an average, only 1.5 percent of ethanol could be blended in India which has now reached about 8.5 percent, he said adding “in 2013-14, about 38 crore litres of ethanol were purchased in the country which has now grown to more than 320 crore litres”.
He said today, a lot of emphasis is being laid on building the necessary infrastructure for the production and purchase of ethanol in the country. Most of the ethanol manufacturing units are mostly concentrated in 4-5 states where sugar production is high but now Food Grain Based Distilleries are being established to expand this to the whole country.
“Modern technology based plants are also being set up in the country to make ethanol from agricultural waste, said Prime Minister.
The Prime Minister said that India is a strong proponent of climate justice and is moving ahead with a lofty global vision like the founding of International Solar Alliance for realizing the vision of One Sun, One World, One Grid and the Coalition for Disaster Resilient Infrastructure initiative. He noted India has been included in the top 10 countries of the world in the Climate Change Performance Index.
The Prime Minister spoke about the hard and soft approaches taken to fight climate change. On the hard approach, he noted that our capacity for renewable energy has increased by more than 250 percent in the last 6-7 years. India is today among the top 5 countries of the world in terms of installed renewable energy capacity. The capacity of solar energy has increased by about 15 times in the last 6 years, he said.
He said along with strengthening the economy, our forests have also increased by 15 thousand square kilometers in the last few years. The number of Tigers in our country has doubled and the number of leopards has also increased by about 60 percent in the last few years.
The Prime Minister spoke about a project which is underway to develop Kevadiya as an electric vehicle city.