Friday, March 28, 2014

Organic Agriculture in India

Organic Agriculture in India
Since January 1994 “Sevagram Declaration” for promotion of organic agriculture in India, organic farming has grown many folds and number of initiatives at Government and Non-Government level has given it a firm direction. While National Programme on Organic Production (NPOP) defined its regulatory framework, the National Project on Organic Farming (NPOF) has defined the promotion strategy and provided necessary support for area expansion under certified organic farming.
Growing certified area
Before the implementation of NPOP during 2001 and introduction of accreditation process for certification agencies, there was no institutional arrangement for assessment of organically certified area. Initial estimates during 2003-04 suggested that approximately 42,000 ha of cultivated land were certified organic. By 2009 India had brought more than 9.2 million ha of land under certification. Out of this while cultivable land was approximately 1.2 million ha, remaining 8 million ha area was forest land for wild collection. Growing awareness, increasing market demand, increasing inclination of farmers to go organic and growing institutional support has resulted into phenomenal growth in total certified area during the last five years. As on March 2009, total area under organic certification process stood at 12.01 lakh ha.
Important features of Indian organic sector
With the phenomenal growth in area under organic management and growing demand for wild harvest products India has emerged as the single largest country with highest arable cultivated land under organic management. India has also achieved the status of single largest country in terms of total area under certified organic wild harvest collection.
With the production of more than 77,000 MT of organic cotton lint India had achieved the status of largest organic cotton grower in the world a year ago, with more than 50% of total world’s organic cotton.
Growing organic food market
Although no systematic information is available on size of organic food market by as per the survey conducted by the International Competence Centre for O

rganic Agriculture (ICCOA) in top 8 metro cities of India (which comprise about 5.3 % of the households) the market potential for organic foods in 2006 in top 8 metros of the country is at Rs 562 crore taking into account current purchase patterns of consumer in modern retail format. The overall market potential is estimated to be around Rs.1452 crore

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