Government revises the Crop Residue Management guidelines

Source: The post is based on the article “Government revises the Crop Residue Management guidelines” published in PIB on 2nd July 2023

What is the News?

The Government of India has revised the crop residue management guidelines for Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, and Delhi to help tackle the challenge of stubble burning in these states and improve air quality.

What are Crop Residues?

Crop residues are materials left in an agricultural field after the crop has been harvested. These residues include stalks and stubble (stems), leaves, and seed pods.

Crop residues are primarily used as bedding material for animals, livestock feed, soil mulching, bio-gas generation, bio-manure/compost, thatching for rural homes, mushroom cultivation, biomass energy production, fuel for domestic and industrial use, etc. 

However, a large portion of crop residue is burnt ‘on-farm’ primarily to clean the field for sowing the next crop. 

The problem of ‘on-farm’ burning of crop residues is intensifying in recent years due to a shortage of human labor, the high cost of removing the crop residue from the field, and mechanized harvesting of crops. 

Adverse effects of crop residue burning: 

Loss of nutrients: It is estimated that burning one tonne of rice straw accounts for the loss of 5.5 kg Nitrogen, 2.3 kg phosphorus, 25 kg potassium, and 1.2 kg sulphur besides, organic carbon.

Impact on soil properties: Heat from burning residues elevates soil temperature, causing death of beneficial soil organisms.

Emission of greenhouse and other gases: Crop residue burning is a potential source of Green House Gases (GHGs) and other chemically and radiative important trace gases and aerosols such as CH4, CO, N2O, NOX, and other hydrocarbons.

What are the revised crop residue management guidelines the government has released?

Techno-commercial pilot projects for Paddy Straw Supply Chain will be established under the bilateral agreement between the Beneficiary/Aggregator (Farmers, Cooperative Societies of Farmers, Farmers Producer Organizations (FPOs), and Panchayats) and Industries utilizing the paddy straw.

Govt shall provide financial assistance on the capital cost of machinery and equipment. 

The required working capital may be financed either by the Industry and Beneficiary jointly or utilizing the Agriculture Infrastructure Fund (AIF), NABARD Financial, or Financing from the Financial Institutions by the beneficiary. 

The land for storage of the collected paddy straw will be arranged and prepared by the beneficiary as may be guided by the end-use industry.

Significance of these revised guidelines: 1) This will supplement the efforts of paddy straw management through in-situ options 2) Air pollution caused by stubble burning will be considerably reduced and 3) It would also help generate employment opportunities of about 9,00,000 man-days.