Four journalists stay in and report from the heart of rural India in a Governance Now and ANSA-SAR project to study the impact of sustained reportage on implementation of welfare schemes

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n January 16, 2013, president Pranab Mukherjee presented the Krishi Karman award to Bihar for a significant increase in production of paddy in 2011-12. The 7.2 million tons produced was 50 percent more than its previous highest yield of 4.6 million tons.

Agriculture minister Narendra Singh accepted the award, which consisted of a trophy, a citation and `10 crore, on behalf of Bihar at Rashtrapati Bhavan. The president also presented an individual award to Sumant Kumar, a farmer from Darveshpura village in Nalanda district, for setting a new world record with production of 22.4 tons per hectare of paddy using SRI methods.

SRI methods, used on more than 3 lakh hectares in the past season (about 12 percent of the paddy area), probably contributed about one-third of state’s increased production as the state agriculture department calculated an average SRI yield of 8.08 t/ha.

Three days before this, on January 13, Nobel laureate Joseph E. Stiglitz, inspired by the progressive farmers of Nalanda who catapulted the district on to the global agriculture map, had visited the farms in Nalanda that have been acknowledged worldwide for getting the highest yield of paddy, onion and potato in recent times using the scientific SRI method along with traditional bio-fertilisers.

The noted author and economist visited organic farms at Sohdih and said that it was amazing that the farmers of the district are prospering using traditional methods in farming that are healthy as well as more productive. He added that the achievements of farmers of the state and the district will definitely inspire farmers of other countries.

While the Bihar government observed 2011-12 as the ‘SRI year’ to promote the methodology in the entire state, the Nalanda district had taken the lead three years ago when the farmers here began experimenting with the farming technique on 10 hectares of land. The results were encouraging and the subsequent year, the total land under SRI methodology in the district had risen to 1,000 hectares. In 2010-11, this figure rose to 4,000 hectares and in 2011-12, to a record-breaking 25,600 hectares.