Order of the National Green Tribunal in the matter of New item titled "Â major fire breaks out at Bhagtanwala Dump” appearing in The Tribune dated 11.05.2024 dated 01/04/2025. The application, registered suo motu, the tribunal considered the issue of legacy waste which has been accumulated at Bhagtanwala garbage dump …
Cereals are by far the most important source of food throughout the world, either directly for human consumption or indirectly in the form of animal feed for livestock products consumed as food. With world population set to rise to nine billion by 2050, there is an urgent need to examine …
The age-old practice of turning the soil before planting a new crop is a leading cause of farmland degradation. Many farmers are thus looking to make plowing a thing of the past.
Concerns for energy conservation, developing sustainable energy sources and interest towards national energy security benefits combined with growing environmental pollution is necessitating the search for renewable energy sources. Of the renewable energy sources, biomass is highly flexible and the least cost alternative. The use of biomass feed stocks in energy …
Ten years ago, running your car on biofuels meant covertly topping up your tank with chip fat. Now petrol is routinely mixed with ethanol made from corn, and diesel with squeezed rape, oil palm and soya. The current generation of biofuels was rushed onto the market in response to escalating …
India carries a huge livestock population. Small ruminants, namely, goats and sheep, play a vital role in securing the livelihood of small and marginal farmers and landless labourers. Such animals should not be blamed for the ecological degradation, soil erosion and desertification caused by human activities. There is an acute …
The biogas yield of rice straw during anaerobic digestion can be substantially increased through solid-state sodium hydroxide (NaOH) pretreatment. This study was conducted to explore the mechanisms of biogas yield enhancement.
A ray of hope is dawning in a few hundred villages of Washim and Akola districts, thanks to a project called the Integrated Sustainable Agricultural Programme (INSAP) being implemented by Yuva-Rural (Youth for Unity and Voluntary Action) with the help of Swiss-Aid India. According to Nitin Maate, a coordinator or …
Rice is the most important Kharif crop of Punjab. With the increase in production of rice there is concomitant increase in the production of residue (rice straw), which is approximately 18.75 MT. About 80 percent of the rice residue it burnt in the fields, particularly after harvesting rice by combine …
Residue burning practice is followed in major Indian states of Uttar Pradesh and Punjab. Agricultural residue burning in the fields and used otherwise for rural domestic needs is responsible for a large number of toxic emissions, which are a health hazard. The main pollutants contributed from biomass burning are aerosols …
Crop residue burning results in the emission of many a toxic pollutants. These emissions can travel long distances affecting thereby the entire region. Due to these emissions the air quality of the region worsens, which results in nose and throat itching and burning, and irritation of the airway tract.
Open field burning of plant material has been a long standing traditional agricultural practice by farmers and foresters. When farmers burn their agricultural lands, the products of combustion are emitted directly into the open air. Heavy smoke, consisting of particulate matter, from these fires clouds the skies. This smoke is …
Rice-wheat is a major crop rotation in the Indo-Gangetic region. Tillage is one of the major crop production operations and is an important contributor to the total cost of production. It is a common observation that direct tilling of any crop into combine-harvested rice stubbles from a reasonable rice yield …
Harvesting a crop generates a huge amount of crop residue. Uttar Pradesh tops the list of the Crop Residue Producing States followed by Punjab, Madhya Pradesh and so on. A large part of this crop residue is burnt in the open fields since the farmers do not have any worthwhile …
The research and development community faces the challenge of sustaining crop productivity gains, improving rural livelihoods, and securing environmental sustainability in the Indo-Gangetic Plains (IGP). This calls for a better understanding of farming systems and of rural livelihoods, particularly with the advent of, and strong advocacy for, conservation farming and …
This study provides an account of the agriculture crop residue burning in Punjab during wheat and rice crop growing periods. Indian Remote Sensing Satellite (IRS-P6) Advanced Wide Field Sensor (AWiFS) data during May and October 2005 have been analysed for estimating the extent of burnt areas and thereby greenhouse gas …
the use of combine harvesters in India for rice and wheat is generating millions of tonnes of crop residue every year. To dispose the waste, farmers usually burn it. This causes significant loss of nutrients in the soil and destroys its microbes, besides adding to greenhouse emissions, a study by …