Monday, 8 January 2018

OBSERVATION BY STUDENTS

As Indian farming system is well diversed especially in Delta regions of Tamilnadu our school students (ATHENA GLOBAL SCHOOL,CHIDAMBARAM)went a field visit to a agriculture field in nearby locality they noticed the type of farming done by the farmers and gained knowledge about the farming methods.Our students also prepared a questionnaire to know about the pros and cons of farming and they came understand the problems faced by the farmers.Followed by this they attended a seminar program conducted by a professor from Department of Agriculture,Annamali University who took a session to brief out the farming methods all over the country and the latest developments in Agricultural techniques in India,Thailand and China. The Professor shared his knowledge about the effect of agriculture production on countries economical growth. Based on all the above studies our students did organic farming inside the school and also applied drip irrigation techniques inside the school.Now our students are knowledgeable about the latest farming techniques and understood the difficulties faced by the farmers in farming.

SAMPLE

AGRICULTURE AND FARMING METHODS

METHODS FOLLOWED:

IN INDIA
IN THAILAND
IN CHINA

IN INDIA

INTRODUCTION

farming Systems in India are strategically utilised, according to the locations where they are most suitable. The farming systems that significantly contribute to the agriculture of India are subsistence farming, organic farming, and industrial farming.Regions throughout India differ in types of farming they use; some are based on horticulture, ley farming, agroforestry, and many more.Due to India's geographical location, certain parts experience different climates, thus affecting each region's agricultural productivity differently. India is very dependent on its monsoon cycle for large crop yields.India's agriculture has an extensive background which goes back to at least 10 thousand years. Currently the country holds the second position in agricultural production in the world. In 2007, agriculture and other industries made up more than 16% of India's GDP. Despite the steady decline in agriculture's contribution to the country's GDP, agriculture is the biggest industry in the country and plays a key role in the socioeconomic growth of the country. India is the second biggest producer of wheat, rice, cotton, sugarcane, silk, groundnuts, and dozens more.

SHIFTING CULTIVATION

Shifting cultivation is a type of subsistence farming where a plot of land is cultivated for a few years until the crop yield declines due to soil exhaustion and the effects of pests and weeds. Once crop yield has stagnated, the plot of land is deserted and the ground is cleared by slash and burn methods, allowing the land to replenish. This type of cultivation is predominant in the eastern and north-eastern regions on hill slopes and in forest areas such as Assam, Meghalaya, Nagaland, Manipur, Tripura, Mizoram, Arunachal Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Orissa, and Andhra Pradesh. Crops such as rain fed rice, corn, buck wheat, small millets, root crops, and vegetables are grown in this system. Eighty-five percent of the total cultivation in northeast India is by shifting cultivation. Due to increasing requirement for cultivation of land, the cycle of cultivation followed by leaving land fallow has reduced from 25–30 years to 2–3 years.

COMMERCIAL AGRICULTURE

In a commercial based agriculture, crops are raised in large scale plantations or estates and shipped off to other countries for money. These systems are common in sparsely populated areas such as Gujarat,Tamil Nadu, Punjab, Haryana, and Maharashtra. Wheat, cotton, sugarcane, and corn are all examples of crops grown commercially.

PLANTATION AGRICULTURE

This extensive commercial system is characterized by cultivation of a single cash crop in plantations of estates on a large scale. Because it is a capital centered system, it is important to be technically advanced and have efficient methods of cultivation and tools including fertilizers and irrigation and transport facilities. Examples of this type of farming are the tea plantations in Assam and West Bengal, the coffee plantations in Karnataka, Kerala, and Tamil Nadu, and the rubber plantations in Kerala and Maharashtra.

DAIRY FARMING

In 2001 India became the world leader in milk production with a production volume of 84 million tons. India has about three times as many dairy animals as the USA, which produces around 75 million tons. Dairy Farming is generally a type of subsistence farming system in India, especially in Haryana, the major producer of milk in the country. More than 40% of Indian farming households are engaged in milk production because it is a livestock enterprise in which they can engage with relative ease to improve their livelihoods. Regular milk sales allow them to move from subsistence to earning a market-based income. The structure of the livestock industry is globally changing and putting poorer livestock producers in danger because they will be crowded out and left behind. More than 40 million households in India are at least partially dependent on milk production, and developments in the dairy sector will have important repercussions on their livelihoods and on rural poverty levels.

THAILAND

AGRICULTURAL METHODS

THAILAND

INTRODUCTION

Agriculture in Thailand is highly competitive, diversified and specialised and its exports are very successful internationally. Rice is the country's most important crop, with some 60 percent of Thailand's 13 million farmers growing it on fully half of Thailand's cultivated land. Thailand is a major exporter in the world rice market. Rice exports in 2014 amounted to 1.3 percent of GDP.Agricultural production as a whole accounts for an estimated 9-10.5 percent of Thai GDP. Forty percent of the population work in agriculture-related jobs. The farmland they work was valued at US$2,945 per rai (0.395 acre; 0.16 ha) in 2013. Most Thai farmers own fewer than eight hectares (50 rai) of land.

Other agricultural commodities produced in significant amounts include fish and fishery products, tapioca, rubber, grain, and sugar. Exports of industrially processed foods such as canned tuna, pineapples, and frozen shrimp are on the rise.

Organic farming

Farmland certified as organic in Thailand amounts to 0.3-0.5 percent of all agricultural land compared with one percent worldwide. From 2010-2014, Thai sales of organic food grew at a seven percent annual rate, compared with five percent for conventional foods. Nevertheless, Thailand's consumption of organic food remains low, with retail sales of just US$0.24 per capita in 2014, compared with US$10 in Japan and US$294 in Switzerland, the world leader. Thailand's leading organic crops are coffee beans, mulberry leaf tea, fresh vegetables and fruit, grown by less than 0.2 percent of Thailand's farmers. Fifty-eight percent of the organic food sold at retail in Thailand is imported.

Due to a program started over forty years ago by a local monk, Surin Province produces about 4,200 tons of organic jasmine rice per year. A local cooperative, the Rice Fund Surin Organic Agriculture Cooperative Ltd, exports its rice to France, Hong Kong, Singapore, Switzerland, and the United States. Surin organic rice farmers receive fifteen baht (US$0.43) per kilogram of paddy, compared with the market price of nine baht/kilo for non-organic jasmine. As the organic rice farmers do not pay for chemical inputs, each can earn about 80,000 baht (US$2,285) per crop, on an average-sized farm of fifteen rai (2.4 hectares).

King Bhumibol was a staunch believer in organic farming. Despite that, successive governments have all promoted chemical-based agriculture. In the 1960s, Thailand joined the so-called "green revolution". Farmers were encouraged to grow new strains of crops that were optimised for chemical inputs. Thailand today is one of the world's top users of farm chemicals. The country imports about 160,000 tonnes of farm chemicals per year at a cost of 22 billion baht. Since 2011, agricultural chemical imports have risen by 50 percent. In 2014, agricultural chemical imports rose over 70 percent to 22 billion baht compared to 2013.According to the World Bank, that makes Thailand the world's fifth biggest consumer of toxic substances, although Thailand ranks only 48th in the world in the extent of its arable land.

Governmental price supports

In November 2016, Prime Minister Prayut Chan-o-cha pledged to improve the well-being of farmers over the following five years. He did so in the face of declining rice prices, the lowest in ten years. He said the improvements would result from "smart farmer projects" initiated by the government, part of its 20-year national strategy. Following up on Prayut's remarks, Agriculture and Cooperatives Minister General Chatchai said that the government's strategy would increase farmer income to 390,000 baht per person per year within 20 years. This, he said, would be achieved by increasing the number of large farms to 5,000 nationwide and by switching 500,000 rai from rice cultivation to other crops. The government allocated eight billion baht for the provision of soft loans to farmers in 35 provinces to switch to growing maize on two million rai.

In 2016 rice subsidies were approved for hom mali, white paddy, Pathum Thani fragrant paddy, and glutinous rice. The government will pay up to 13,000 baht per tonne to growers who store their rice until overall rice prices gradually recover.

Traditions

Rain-making ceremonies are common for rice farmers in Thailand. One such ceremony happens in Bangkok and involves the lord of the Royal Plowing Ceremony throwing rice kernels as he walks around the Grand Palace as the crown prince of Thailand watches. Another tradition that is common to central Thailand is a "cat procession". This involves villagers parading a cat around and throwing water at it, in the belief that a "crying" cat brings a fertile rice crop.

Sunday, 7 January 2018

Agriculture in china

AGRICULTURE IN CHINA

Introduction

-Agriculture is a vital industry in China, employing over 300 million farmers.China ranks first in worldwide farm output, primarily producing rice, wheat, potatoes, tomato, sorghum, peanuts, tea, millet, barley, cotton, oilseed and soybeans. Although accounting for only 10 percent of arable land worldwide, it produces food for 20 percent of the world's population.

-The development of farming over the course of China's history has played a key role in supporting the growth of what is now the largest population in the world. Analysis of stone tools by Professor Liu Li and others has shown that the origins of Chinese agriculture is rooted in the pre-agricultural Paleolithic. During this time, hunter-gatherers harvested wild plants with the same tools that would later be used for millet and rice

-Due to China's status as a developing country and its severe shortage of arable land, farming in China has always been very labor-intensive. However, throughout its history, various methods have been developed or imported that enabled greater farming production and efficiency. They also utilized the seed drill to help improve on row farming.

Food safety

-As a developing nation, China has relatively low sanitary and phytosanitary (SPS) standards for its agricultural goods. Corruption in the government, such as the bribery of the former head of the State Food and Drug Administration Zheng Xiaoyu, has also complicated China's regulation difficulties.Excessive pesticide residues, low food hygiene, unsafe additives, contamination with heavy metals and other contaminants, and misuse of veterinary drugs have all led to trade restrictions with developed nations such as Japan, the United States, and the European Union.

-These problems have also led to public outcry, such as in the melamine-tainted dog food scare and the carcinogenic-tainted seafood import restriction, leading to measures such as the "China-free" label.About one tenth of China's farmland is contaminated with heavy metals, according to the Ministry of Environmental Protection of the People's Republic of China

-One important motivator of increased international trade was China's inclusion in the World Trade Organization (WTO) on December 11, 2001, leading to reduced or eliminated tariffs on much of China's agricultural exports. Due to the resulting opening of international markets to Chinese agriculture, by 2004 the value of China's agricultural exports exceeded $17.3 billion (US). Since China's inclusion in the WTO, its agricultural trade has not been liberalized to the same extent as its manufactured goods trade. Markets within China are still relatively closed-off to foreign companies.

Organic food products

-China has developed a Green Food program where produce is certified for low pesticide input. This has been articulated into Green food Grade A and Grade AA. This Green Food AA standard has been aligned with IFOAM international standards for organic farming and has formed the basis of the rapid expansion of organic agriculture in China.

International trade

-China is the world's largest importer of soybeans and other food crops, and is expected to become the top importer of farm products within the next decade. In 2017, farmers in the providence of Donggaozhuang began selling yarn in an online marketplace owned by Alibaba Group. Many farmers later sold their farmland to focus on online sales as the access to global consumers yielded much more income then traditional farming.

-While most years China's agricultural production is sufficient to feed the country, in down years, China has to import grain. Due to the shortage of available farm land and an abundance of labor, it might make more sense to import land-extensive crops (such as wheat and rice) and to save China's scarce cropland for high-value export products, such as fruits, nuts, or vegetables. In order to maintain grain independence and ensure food security, however, the Chinese government has enforced policies that encourage grain production at the expense of more-profitable crops. Despite heavy restrictions on crop production, China's agricultural exports have greatly increased in recent years.

Agicultural techiques

Incremental improvements of the current method, aimed at boosting crop growth and improving environmental quality

A yield-maximizing approach with no regard to either financial or environmental cost

An integrated soil-crop system management" (ISSM) approach that used crop models to redesign the production system

Nitrogen fertilizer is used extensively in modern agriculture and nowhere more than in China. Overall, Chinese farmers overuse fertilizer, with much of it ultimately polluting the air and water and contributing to hundreds of thousands of premature deaths each year. The production and transport of fertilizer also contributes significantly to agriculture's share of greenhouse gas emissions that fuel climate change.