As India is still primarily an agro-economy despite the opening up of other sectors and gradual loosening of state control, the agriculture ministry and its departments play a very important role in shaping the country’s economy. The Department of Agricultural Research and Education (DARE) has a predominantly scientific and educative role with a national network of 49 institutes including four that have deemed university status, six National Bureaus, 18 National Research Centers, 24 Project Directorates, 89 All India Coordinated Research Projects and 45 agriculture universities spread across India.

The department, along with Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) under it, was instrumental in ushering in the Green Revolution, the period after 1965 involving the introduction of pesticides and high-yield seeds where agricultural production peaked. Technology also enabled farmers to increase crop yields. The department has made a visible impact on national food security, a crucial issue for a country with a population of well over a billion people.

DARE was created in 1973 and over the years some changes have been made to make it function better. In 1991, the agricultural ministry was reorganized and two divisions - Animal Husbandry and Dairy Development - were combined and renamed the Department of Animal Husbandry and Dairying (DAHD).

In February 2004, a National Commission on Farmers (NCF) was established to recommend policies and suggest measures for accelerated, diversified agricultural development to alleviate rural poverty and improve the welfare of farmers and their families. Since then, the Ministry of Agriculture has consisted of a) Department of Agriculture and Cooperation – which is responsible for national policies for the growth of agriculture b) DARE and c) DAHD.

DARE coordinates and promotes agricultural research and education in the country. It acts as a bridge between ICAR and government. It also liaises with foreign governments, the United Nations, Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR) and other multilateral agencies for cooperation in various areas of agricultural research. DARE is also a single-point for admissions of foreign students into Indian agriculture universities and ICAR institutes.

ICAR by itself organizes short-term training programs for groups and hosts individual scientists at its establishments for longer periods, especially to research new and emerging fields.

DARE also manages international cooperation on agricultural research and education in India. Currently, a sampling of multi-lateral include: Agreement on World Mango Encyclopedia between ICAR and Oman; Memorandum of Agreement between ICAR and Sri Lanka’s CARP for short term training of Sri Lankan scientists in agriculture and allied sciences; MoU between DARE and Ministry of Jihad-E-Agriculture, Iran, for short-term study visits/training of scientists from both countries in agriculture, fisheries, dairying and human resource management; MoU between India and the Republic of Ecuador for cooperation in the field of research in horticulture, crop science, fisheries, animal science, agricultural extension, education and engineering and natural resource management.

The department has dedicated itself to work on fundamental crop research and educational coordination between farmers and scientists to increase yield and also provide them with information that would help them plan crops better. It also researches yield-enhancing techniques and encourages its scientists to bring out new varieties of crops with higher yields.

Agriculture in India is through irrigation channels, rain-fed and drip irrigation. Of late, a majority of farmers are switching over to cash crops such as sugarcane, tobacco, arecanut and other plantation crops. In fact, in areas under command area development authority, where a network of irrigation channels feed ploughed land, state governments have regulated farming to an extent that growing cash crops has been banned.

As most farming is non-mechanized and in small holdings (their sizes can easily be termed miniscule by American standards), innovations led by DARE has helped leverage the sector with innovative instruments given to farmers. They include laser land-leveler, self-propelled sprayers, precision seeders and planters, transplanters for rice and vegetable seedlings, multi-crop threshers, harvesters for cereals and sugarcane with an eye on resource conservation especially in these times of labor shortage.

DARE develops many seed variants for crops cultivated in India. Agriculture activity is mainly in two seasons – the kharif crop and the rabi. Kharif, the southwesterly monsoon crops include rice, pearl millet, maize, ragi (a millet variety), peanut and cotton; rabi, the post-monsoon crops are wheat, barley and oats. These are all the staple food of most regions and hardly figure in the export list. The exception, of course, is the premium variety of rice, basmati.

Commercially, oilseed crops such as groundnut, rapeseed, mustard, sesame, linseed, castor, sunflower and others are grown and they provide a balance in the economy as vegetable and non-vegetable oil is widely consumed within India. These account for an annual production of about 10 million tons and cultivated on 16.5 million hectares.

There is a lot of agriculture research and education being done in these areas.

DARE oversees two autonomous bodies – Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) and Central Agricultural University (CAU) situated in Imphal, Manipur.

ICAR: Headquartered in New Delhi, ICAR is an autonomous organization under DARE’s auspices. Formerly known as the Imperial Council of Agricultural Research and founded on July 16, 1929, it was a registered society under the Societies Registration Act, 1860 in pursuance of the report of the Royal Commission on Agriculture.

The council is the apex body for coordinating, guiding and managing research and education in agriculture including horticulture, fisheries and animal sciences across the country. With 97 ICAR institutes and 47 agricultural universities nationwide, it claims to be one of the largest national agriculture systems in the world.

ICAR offers graduate to doctoral programs in 11 disciplines in agriculture, horticulture, fisheries, forestry, home science, sericulture agricultural engineering, dairy technology, food science and technology, agricultural marketing, banking and cooperation, and veterinary sciences. It also offers 65 masters programs.

ICAR has a continuing cooperation program with universities and governments abroad. All such programs are routed through government ministries such as finance, external affairs, commerce and science, and technology. Currently, it has 40 such MoU/work plans of cooperation. It has also contributed funds to research institutes abroad (an example is International Society for Horticulture Science, Belgium).

ICAR has a separate unit called Indo-US Knowledge Initiative on Agriculture. It has also set up an intellectual property rights management cell to protect India’s indigenous varieties of crops.

Within ICAR, there are dedicated institutes for researches on topics ranging from rice variants and plant genetics to human resource management.

CAU: This university was established by the Central Agricultural University Act 1992 (No. 42 of 1992, an Act of Parliament of India) and came into being in 1993. Headquartered at Imphal, the jurisdiction of this university covers six Northeastern hill states of Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Sikkim and Tripura. Graduate and masters programs offered by colleges of the region are affiliated to CAU.

Money for this department is spent mainly on research projects, education assistance, paying salaries to its employees and maintaining the institutions. It has also set aside a part of the expenditure to fund international projects between India and other nations working on seed testing and other agricultural research.

DARE outlay in the 10th five-year plan period was Rs 5368 crore ($10.28 Million USD) of a total agriculture ministry’s outlay of Rs. 21,068 crore ($40.34 Million USD).

American Companies Patent Indian Traditional Medicines and Foods

The largest area of dispute is over what constitutes intellectual property. There is history of traditional Indian medical practices being passed off as discoveries, especially by American conglomerates.

Indian scientists are concerned about what they term foreign bio-pirates, whom they accuse of grabbing credit after patent and geographical indication laws were introduced by the west. These  patents of indigenous Indian varieties, make it difficult for Indian firms to export such varieties.

In the late 1990s, the Indian government and Ricetec, a Texas company, fought over basmati rice. Indian activists, led by Vandana Shiva, claimed that Ricetec’s basmati rice was a result of bio-piracy. Only later, in 2001, the Indian government declared that there was not much reason for the dispute and Ricetec-patented basmati would not affect India’s basmati rice exports.

However, scientists remained wary after this incident especially in a fast globalizing and increasingly flat world. Another controversy dogged neem, long considered a medicinal tree in India, its used as a pesticide, spermicide and its branches are even used a natural toothbrush. An US-based company has sued many Indian firms for producing ‘emulsion’ of neem, a process it claims to have patented on the procedure. The issue still surfaces once occasionally in the mainstream media. It’s unclear what steps the government of India has taken to combat these patents.

Piracy by Patent: The Case of the Neem Tree (by Vandana Shiva and Radha Holla-Bhar)

India Moves to Protect Traditional Medicines (International Centre for Trade and Sustainable Development)

The Basmati Rice Patent: It Is Certainly Not A Misunderstanding… (by Suman Saha, Genecampaign.org)

Wheat Bio-Piracy: The Real Issues the Government Is Avoiding (by Vandana Shiva, Z Mag)

Are Gentically-Modified Foods Acceptable?

There is an ongoing debate in India about whether or not genetically modified foods are beneficial. For many years, the import and introduction of genetically modified (GM) seeds, which claim both better yields and inbuilt pest controls, have been opposed by some Indian farmers. Despite government permission, environmental NGOs have kept the momentum going against their introduction, despite reasonable success stories. On the one hand, state governments have collaborated directly with multi-national corporations. Yet prominent members of the scientific community, many of them advisers to the government, are opposed to the entry of GM crops.

According to the Ministry of Agriculture’s 2010-11 data, of the total 111.42 lakh hectares under cotton cultivation, 98.54 lakh hectares are sown using Bt Cotton. Gujarat, Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh are among the top cotton producers with 105, 88 and 53 lakh bales cotton production respectively. But, the entry of Bt cotton was fiercely debated and activists even resorted to arson by setting on fire Monsanto offices less than a decade ago.

Yes, They are Acceptable

In the recent past, genetically modified Bacillus Thuringiensis Brinjal (the vegetable is called eggplant in America and aubergine in Europe) was at the centre of a controversy. It was claimed that this particular type of brinjal, introduced by Mahyco, a subsidiary of multinational seed giant Monsanto and the Maharashtra government, would improve yield and help the agricultural sector grow. The company also claimed that Bt seeds were pest-resistant as seen in Bt Cotton trials.

No, They are Not Acceptable

But activists opposed to BT Brinjal cite documented research where GM crops tested on rats have proved to be harmful to lungs and kidneys. So, there is a general view that it would be “dangerous” to introduce such experimental foods into the market without proper research even as the government of India maintains a studied silence on the issue after initially agreeing with the concerns of the NGOs. The anti-GM movement frequently quotes studies by Gilles-Eric Seralini, a French scientist, on Mahyco that have raised serious health concerns.

Break the BRAI Bill, Cry Karnataka Farmers (DNA)

Bt Brinjal can Damage Liver, Hit Immunity: Study (by Dinesh C. Sharma, India Today)