A state level workshop on Natural Farming: A Climate Resilient Approach towards Sustainable Development was organised here on Wednesday. Jharkhand is one of the most climate-vulnerable states of India. The impact of climate change on Jharkhand agriculture is significant. The agriculture sector needs pathways to improve farmer’s livelihoods while mitigating emissions and adapting climate change. Against this backdrop, Natural Farming is one of the most appropriate farming systems that can help farmers adapt to climate change and variability while promoting sustainability and resilience. In this context, this workshop presented a platform to share experiences and learnings from the field and discuss what the civil society in Jharkhand needs to do to promote climate resilient farming in the state.
This workshop was attended by various Civil society representatives, agricultural experts, academicians and farmers practicing natural farming. The event started with lighting of the lamp by PHIA Foundation’s State lead Dheeraj Daniel Horo along with farmer participants, Horo welcomed the delegate and set the context emphasizing the need for such workshops to engage in a dialogue around sustainable farming. This was followed by Santosh and Prakritee from PHIA presenting about the organization's work on the field and its impact.
Professor Siddharth Jaiswal from Birsa Agricultural University, (BPD-BAU) mentioned that we have to back to our roots and History, we are now finding scientific rationale behind our ancient methods of cultivation. He also emphasized that CSO’s need to partner with academic/research institutes to produce academic/research papers about their learnings from the field. He believes translating the data we receive on the field and converting into academic papers is a way to influence policy.
Four farmers Jerome Topno, Arvind Toppo, Dayal Kandulna and Nicholas Kandulna from Thetaitangar and Rania Block, PHIA’s intervention area shared their positive experience and challenges of adopting natural farming. They talked about how after the initial hesitancy of adopting natural farming, it eventually yielded results and now other people in the community are also showing interest in learning the SRI method of paddy cultivation.
The final session of the workshop was a panel discussion having representatives from PRADAN, CSO Forum and National Coalition for Natural Farming, moderated by PHIA. This session saw a stimulating discussion. It was highlighted that along with natural farming we need to also learn and practice regenerative farming and also the need to engage with the state collectively to have a share of sustainable farming in the state.
The programme concluded with the organizers summing up the day’s key takeaways and the way forward. Today’s state level workshop left the participants energized to engage and exchange their best practices on different techniques of sustainable farming.