कृषि एवं किसान कल्याण विभाग
Department of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare
राष्ट्रीय जैविक एवं प्राकृतिक खेती केंद्रNational Centre for Organic and Natural Farming
कृषि एवं किसान कल्याण विभाग
Department of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare
राष्ट्रीय जैविक एवं प्राकृतिक खेती केंद्रNational Centre for Organic and Natural Farming
National Centre for Organic Farming is a nodal organization for promotion of organic farming under INM Division, Department of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare, Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare, Government of India under Soil Health Management component of National Mission on Sustainable Agriculture (NMSA).
NCOF came into force in 2004, for implementing National Project on Organic Farming (NPOF) along with its Regional Centres.
National Centre for Organic Farming has been renamed as National Centre for Organic and Natural Farming (NCONF), Ghaziabad in March 2022 with five Regional Centres for Organic and Natural Farming (RCONFs) located at Ghaziabad (North Zone), Bengaluru (South Zone), Bhubaneshwar (East Zone), Nagpur (West and Central) and Imphal (North East zone).
With promotion of organic farming, through technical capacity building of all stakeholders including human resource development, compilation and publication of techniques and technology, execution, implementation and advancement in Certification systems specially low cost PGS India programme, awareness and publicity through print and electronic media. Statutory quality control of biofertilizers and organic fertilizers under the Fertilizer Control Order (FCO, 1985) including revision of standard and testing protocols keeping in view of advances in research/authentication of strains and also to bringing new commercially traded organic fertilizer under FCO.
With capacity building on organic and natural farming as its mandate, NCONF has the focal point on awareness cum training, dissemination of information and compilation of technologies and farmers practices for chemical free farming which support the livelihood of close to 2 million Indians. Organic and natural farming have several unique challenges because of the labour involved in preparing organic inputs, extra effort needed to document farm activities for inspection and verification (Certifications) as well as recalcitrance to biological interventions. Despite these bottlenecks, NCONF is delivering many expert solutions to adopt organic/natural farming, improve the production, protection, value addition and certification aspects in organic and natural farming. In tandem with the aim of the Government to reduce the load of fertilisers, improve soil health and enhance the income/benefits of farmers and sustain the environment, NCONF has chalked out future activities as per Annual Action Plan that align with the mandate of NCONF:
To tap the vast national ICAR R&D knowledge and infrastructure the trainings and seminars are being co-organised through SAUs and KVKs and field demonstration approaches coupled with IT enabled technology like mobile app, webinars and surveillance particularly for quality assurance in certification. While the Institute has pioneered the unique PGS India Certification programme through online PGS India web portal involving crop production, processing and handling with livestock components, it is now moving ahead to harness the IT enabled tools like mobile app and related technologies to further improve the quality assurance in the supply chain. Novel and innovative technologies blended with traditional practices for on farm biomass resource that return critical carbon, back to the soil and sustain the environment, are getting fine-tuned in FCO and available for wider adoption and for organic farming.
Several next-generation value-added technologies/products innovated by ICAR/SAUs that can enhance farmer's income and overcome poverty in the field of organic and natural farming are in the pipeline. Concerted efforts to disseminate, transfer, evaluate and fine-tune the technologies in close interactions with farmers and other stakeholders are being continually upgraded in the form of training manuals and booklets. The Institute’s collaboration with many think tank organizations to develop policy briefs to raise the visibility of organic and natural farming in national agriculture scenario is under progress. Thus, NCONF has streamlined its Institute activities/ programmes with national agricultural priorities and aims to serve the stakeholders in a better manner in the coming years.
Dr. Gagnesh Sharma
Director
