He has raised a valid concern about the application of 2008 organic farming guidelines, and rightfully cautioned us about the possibility of being duped by organic talk. Beyond that, most of his arguments are too sweeping and lack substance. According to Bhatta, because organic system does not have high productivity, it is not suitable for ensuring adequate food to all in Nepal. “It is not suitable to go back to the practices of our ancestors,” he says, “(because) that will certainly lead to only one-fourth of current output.”
However, where did this productivity comparison come from? He does not tell us. It appears his objective of touring the villages in Dhading was not to find out why farmers were switching from chemical-based to organic agriculture. He has no analysis about that in his essay. His essay merely repeats the age-old claims about chemical-input based farming that we have been hearing for the last several decades in Nepal.
That chemical-inputs, hybrid seeds, irrigation and machines will produce agricultural cornucopia was the assumption of agriculture development projects that were introduced in Nepal in the 1950s. Part of these projects involved transferring these ideas through radio programs, newspapers, television, minister’s speeches, king’s pronouncements, experts’ columns, teashop gossips, agricultural technicians and trainings in various agricultural schools and colleges. Nepal’s agricultural problems were reduced to the continued practices of ‘traditional’ farming and, as a corollary, lack of adequate use of chemicals, machines and hybrid seeds. These assumptions have by now acquired an aura of self-evident truths and Bhatta’s essay is full of them.
Therefore, he labels the organic practitioners as the proverbial jogi who, while he did not have basic medicine, looked for something luxurious (Harro napaudako jogi, jaifalko bhogi). Since some years, newspapers have been reporting that many farmers in Dhading, Kavre, Sindhupalchowk, Dhankuta, Chitwan, Tanahun, Lamjung, Surkhet, Baglung and many other districts have begun to adopt more sustainable and organic agricultural practices. By his logic, most of these farmers must have been duped by some NGOs or a few government agricultural extension technicians.
There are increasing evidences from around the world that organic farming can be very productive and is central to ensuring food security, better health and ecological well-being.
After one-and-a-half year’s work with a join-venture commercial bank, I went to my maternal uncle’s house in Chitwan to get involved in organic agriculture in 1991. I am a little over 40 now. Then, at the age of 22, when I began to seriously practice farming, I realized that just because we all grew up in agricultural milieu does not mean we know what agriculture involves. For instance, the complexity of soil, bio-diversity, and ecology are not reducible to a few fragmented compositions of chemicals and elements. A pinch of fertile soil contains billions of microbes, millions of fungi and thousands of small animals. Their presence is crucial to regulate the nutrient cycle among living organisms. Obviously, things have changed during the last two decades and it is heartening to note that the Rampur Agricultural College, which was central to promoting chemical-input based agriculture in Nepal, has recently begun to offer course in sustainable agriculture.
I visited Nepal in December 2008 and met Chandra Adhikari of Fulbari village in Chitwan. What I saw in his farm was nothing short of a miracle in the making. In a small plot of land (around two acres/one bigha), he had designed a system of livestock-vegetable-fishery-grain-fruit combinations with amazing finesse. The most inspiring part of the visit involved hearing from him about a couple of hundred farming families in his village who had begun to adopt chemical-free sustainable agricultural practices. During my visit, they were in the process of forming a cooperative so that they could process their produce and take control over marketing. A few weeks ago, myrepublica.com had published news about Adhikari’s son’s wedding in which the guests were treated with organic food produced in the village.
During the last 18 years of my public life, I have come across practitioners like Adhikari who have slowly begun to redefine what it means to do farming that can be both productive while improving soil fertility, bio-diversity and human health. There are increasing evidences from around the world that organic farming can be very productive and is central to ensuring food security, better health and ecological well-being. A study carried out across several African countries jointly by United Nations Environment Program and United Nations Conference on Trade and Development in 2008 found that sustainable agricultural practitioners were not only saving soil and nature but are also producing more, conserving diversity and increasing their income. If it were only about productivity, it won’t be hard to promote organic agriculture. There are enough examples about highly-productive organic agricultural practices. Between 1991-1996, I saw very closely how a small plot of land could be made highly-productive in producing most of the grains and vegetables, energy and a small surplus. Seeing Chandra dai’s farm in 2008 was a source of vindication of that.
There are other factors that militate against farming in general and sustainable farming in particular in Nepal. For one, the disparity between highly-privatized market economy and farming economy is glaring. A surgeon performing surgery on a leg broken during farm work earns money in a day equivalent to over a year’s earning from a relatively modest family farm. No wonder, private medical expenses have become the singlemost cause of impoverishment in Nepal, in the US and many places around the world. Farmers are worst positioned currently when it comes to putting price on their own produce while they have no control over things they have to get from the market.
Many of those who decide on matters of crucial national policies in agriculture and food are still deeply entrenched in the assumptions about chemical agriculture. There are definitely some changes underway. We must note here that in many districts, the government agricultural technicians have begun promoting organic and sustainable practices.
I left farming because life had become very unattractive for young people like me in the rural areas. There was an increasing pressure to exit the farm and make it to the urban economy and now foreign-job and education. A few weeks ago Sushma Joshi wrote about burgeoning organic farming in rural areas including in Dhading. But the young ones were still voting with their feet. Something surely was either lacking in the villages or some things in the cities were too alluring. Perhaps, we need to have theaters and cafes, concerts and dance festivals, sports and film festivals, just like in the cities, she had written.
It might be worthwhile to explore some of the obstacles for building sustainable agricultural systems, rather than ridiculing the emerging practitioners. They are the ones who are showing promising signs of conserving the foundations – the soils, biodiversity and farming practices – of our food system. We will be impoverished even further without them.
anilbhattarai@gmail.com
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