Traditional and modern farming

Water: rain-fed or irrigated?

Crops cannot grow without water. Rain-fed farming depends only on rain. It is common where the monsoon is good, but droughts and late rains can ruin it, so farmers choose crops that survive dry spells and harvest rainwater. Irrigated farming brings water to the crops, which raises harvests and lowers the risk from a weak monsoon.

India has built water structures since the Indus civilisation, and many regions have their own names for them, such as kund, ahar, pokhar, khadin and eri. Phad systems in Maharashtra are run by the community and use small canals to divert river water to fields. In the Northeast, farmers use bamboo pipes to carry spring water to their fields. Farm ponds keep the soil moist for longer. Kallanai, built by Karikala across the Kaveri about 1,800 years ago, still irrigates thousands of hectares. Modern drip irrigation drips water at the roots through tubes, and sprinklers spray it like rain. Both save water, which matters because groundwater is falling fast in many parts of India.

Seeds

Seeds have long been saved in families, kept by communities and shared; women sometimes carry them as gifts to their new home. Farmers kept the seeds of their highest-yielding plants for the next season. The Arthashastra explains how to prepare different seeds, and ancient Indian farmers invented a seed drill that prepared the soil, planted the seed and closed the furrow in one step. ICAR has developed ways of coating seeds with beejamrit, a paste of cow dung and urine with other materials, before planting; it protects the seeds and helps them sprout sooner. Many farmers now buy high-yielding, pest-resistant seeds from companies, but the seeds from those plants are often not good for the next season, so farmers must keep buying.

Traditional farming systems

Traditional farming sees the plant, the soil and the living things in it as one system: bacteria and fungi make nutrients easy for plants to take up, and plants feed them through their roots. It uses farmyard manure, small-scale methods and local resources. Terrace farming cuts steps into hillsides to make flat land, stop soil erosion and save water. Kulagar is a homestead system of the Konkan in which families grow food crops, cash crops, fruits, spices and medicinal plants around their homes. In gokrishi, cows give manure and bullocks plough. ICAR has recorded almost 5,000 traditional practices and found that over 85% of those it tested are backed by modern science.

The Green Revolution

The Green Revolution of the 1960s and 1970s brought high-yielding varieties (HYV) of seeds, more irrigation, chemical fertilisers and pesticides, and machines such as tractors and harvesters. Food grain production, especially of wheat and rice, rose sharply, and India became self-sufficient in food. M.S. Swaminathan, the scientist called its architect, received the Bharat Ratna.

Over the decades its limits have become clear: soil that grows poorer, groundwater that keeps falling, soil and water polluted by chemicals, and harm to the health of people and animals. Chemicals also kill bees, which crops need for pollination.

Sustainable pathways

Sustainable farming tries to keep the high output of modern methods while protecting nature, drawing on Indian Knowledge Systems. Organic farming uses compost, seed cake and animal manure instead of chemicals, and neem-based pesticides are much less harmful. Sikkim became the world’s first fully organic state after banning chemical fertilisers and pesticides in 2014. The FAO recognises three Indian farming systems as global heritage: saffron farming in Kashmir, forest-linked farming in Odisha, and below-sea-level rice farming with fishing in Kerala.

Why it matters

Modern methods give large harvests quickly; traditional ones are gentler on the soil but may give less. Farming that lasts needs both. To see how crops follow the seasons, read what grows where and when; for soil care, read soils of India. Answers to the textbook questions are in the NCERT solutions for Part 2 Chapter 1; see all of Part 2 Chapter 1 notes.