Our National Policy on Organic Farming

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Umesh Chandrasekhar is a B-Tech from IIT Madras. After he finished his B-Tech we became friends since he worked in and around Chennai. He first worked in a bubble gum factory, then for a fire extinguishing company, then moved to Auroville, met his future wife and, after marriage moved in to a 12 acre farm in Dharmapuri where he still lives today. Around 1997 he was starting up the Indian operations of IMO Control a German/Swiss an Organc Farming Inspection and Certification agency. He was running short of inspectors and asked me if I could help. After taking permission from the Chairman of the Shri AMM Murugappa Chettiar Board of Directors, I did inspect farms for IMO Control for 3 years (1997 to 2000).

Towards the end of this period the Government of India was looking to frame its own organic standards. They outsourced the work to the Biotech Consortium of India Limited. Dr PVSM Gowri took the lead in framing the National Programme on Organic Production. Though this has not been made into law in India it is accepted as the Standards document for India and can be seen at http://agmarknet.nic.in/NPOPStandards%28English%29.pdf

Sanjay Bansal, a dashing and dynamic tea estate owner from Darjeeling, Umesh and I spent many hours of intense discussion with Dr. Gowri on how the standards should look like. Umesh was particularly concerned that the small and marginal farmers should not be overlooked in the standard.

The Union Minister of State for Agriculture, Professor K.V. Thomas stated,  ”Nine States, including Kerala, had drafted policies for organic farming promotion. Among them, Sikkim, Mizoram and Uttarakhand have declared intention to go 100 per cent organic in due course”.  See http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/todays-paper/tp-agri-biz-and-commodity/article1028571.ece

The hope should be that if individual states go organic, then the rest of the country may follow suit.