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Millets: Path to the Future

If India needs to secure its food and farming for this century, there is an urgent need to recognize millets as the future of this country and adopt relevant steps. It is also important to realize that for a New Age crisis such as the Climate Crisis, millets are a New Age Answer... ..... the fact that millets are extremely eco-friendly followed by the following reasons:

They thrive on non-chemical agronomic practices
In a broad sense they are pest-free crops
Millet farming is home to agro-biodiversity
They do not need irrigation for their cultivation
They can grow on the poorest of soils
In the hands of traditional farmers, millet farming needs zero energy input
They offer not only food but also fodder, health, nutrition, livelihood and ecological security. Thus, while other food crops can offer us food security, millets can offer multiple securities.
IMPACT ON AGRICULTURE

Millets can grow without synthetic fertilisers

Millets do not demand chemical fertilizers. In fact under dry land conditions, millets grow better in the absence of chemical fertilizers.
Therefore most farmers grow them using farmyard manure under purely
ecological conditions. In recent years, farmers have also started using
bio-fertilisers such as vermicompost
produced in their backyard and
growth- promoters such as panchgavya, amritpani, etc. These practices make millet production not only ecological, but also keep it under the control of farmers.

Millets are pest-free crops

Grown with traditional local landraces and under ecological conditions, most millets are totally pest free and hence do not need any pesticides. Even in storage conditions, most do not have any need for fumigants. E.g. The Foxtail millet acts as an anti-pest agent in the storage of delicate pulses such as
green gram.

ken...you are talking about the' the ketogenic diet.'

Millets can grow without irrigation

Do you know how much water we use for growing a kilo of rice? It is an incredible 3000-4000 litres of water!

Assuming that the minimum yield of rice in a chemically-grown Green Revolution model is about 2000 kilos per acre, that acre uses between six and eight million litres of water. If, on the same field you grow millets, you can save six to eight million litres of water for the nation. Even if you price this water at one paisa a litre, a millet farmer contributes nearly Rs.60, 000 per year for every acre of the farm she/he cultivates, to the national kitty.

In a sense, millet farmers are the only ones who do not demand any subsidy from the state, on the contrary subsidise the state exchequer. Consider the fact that nearly 60 million acres of land in India are under millet cultivation. This area contributes in terms of water close to Rs. 350 billion every year to the national income as its own water cess! A contribution never discussed in the august chambers of celebrated economists at the national level. Through such silences, the millet farmers have been completely marginalised.

Millets grow on the poorest of soils

Millets are adapted to a wide range of ecological conditions, often growing on soils that are less than eight inches deep. They do not demand rich soils for their survival and growth. Most millets can be grown on low fertility soils, some in acidic soils and some on saline soils. Millets such as Pearl millet can be grown on sandy soils as is done in Rajasthan; so for the vast dryland area, they are a boon.

Poor farmers especially in dryland India are owners of very poor lands. Much of the cultivable fallows and low fertility farms have been handed to them through the process of land reforms and the Jajmani system of Inam lands. The only crops that sustain agriculture and food security on these lands are millets.

The capacity of millets to grow on poor soils can be gauged from the fact that they also grow in sub - Sahelian soil conditions in West Africa - which produces 74% of all the millets grown in Africa and 28% of the world production. If they grow in such zones where rainfall can average less than 500 mm, using soils that are sandy and slightly acidic, it is a testimony to their hardiness and extraordinary capacity to survive very harsh conditions. That is why millets can withstand drought-like conditions in the Deccan and Rajasthan and produce food and fodder.

sorry.....too much to say on this....but...i have to go offline...my duty calls