PM Pranam Scheme

Summary:To promote Green Agriculture and address the dual challenge of ensuring affordable chemical fertilisers for agricultural needs while mitigating environmental concerns, the Indian government introduced the PM PRANAM scheme in Union Budget 2023-24. This initiative aims to achieve sustainable agricultural practices, prioritising environmental considerations, and reducing dependence on chemical fertilisers in a highly regulated fertiliser industry.

Green Revolution in India brought use of chemical fertilizers which would boost the yield per acre hence boosting farmers income and the food security for India. However, overtime, the yield of land has gone down as the soil has degraded due to overuse of fertiliser. In response, farmers used more fertilizers without any regulation in the hopes that their yields will improve. This has led to two pronged challenges for India. First, the neverending increasing use of fertilizer is damaging the soil, environment and are bad for human consumption. Second, these expensive fertilizers are subsidised by the government, cost of which reached Rs 1.63 lakh crore in 2021-22. Despite this subsidy, the costs for farming are still very high for the farmers in the country, making it difficult to make ends meet.

The PM PRANAM scheme was launched in the Union Budget 2023-24 to incentivise reduction of chemical fertilisers in lieu of alternative natural fertilizers with the aim of promoting sustainable use of land and boosting health of Mother Earth. It also promoted organic farming and resource conservation technology. The scheme sets up Grants to be given to State/ UTs. These grants will be the amount they saved by reducing expenditure on existing fertilizer subsidies. Hence, the scheme seeks to create efficiency without additional expenses.

• High import dependency which depletes country’s forex reserves
• Huge subsidy bill affecting the country’s fiscal health (0.5% of the GDP)
• Increased input cost for the farmers due to high prices and high per capita usage
• Affects soil health
  • Imbalanced Use: The ideal ratio of NPK fertilisers should be 4:2:1, but in India it is 8:3:1. This shows the overuse of nitrogenous fertilisers i.e., Urea
  • High fertiliser usage also leads to the problems of leaching of chemicals to the ground water, eutrophication, increased acidity of soil, bioaccumulation and biomagnification, as well as declining yield over time
• Overuse of chemical fertilisers leads to a
• decline in our agricultural exports
due to the Sanitary and Phytosanitary measures (SPS) in countries like US, UK, etc
• Increased black marketing and diversion of urea including smuggling due to its cheap availability in India compared to neighbouring countries

• To promote the usage of alternative fertilisers like bio-fertilizers and other scientifically engineered fertilisers eg. Nano Liquid Urea, etc to balance out the use of chemical fertilisers.
• Any savings in subsidy amount, in comparison to past three year’s average subsidy given, by the States/ UTs will be passed on to them in the form of grants
• The centre will provide 50% of the subsidy savings to the states as a grant
• Out of the grant, 70% can be used to create assets related to the technological adoption of alternative fertilisers, and production units at various levels
• The remaining 30% can be used to reward and encourage farmers, panchayat, and other stakeholders involved in fertiliser reduction and awareness generation
• This is a money-saving incentive scheme.

• National Mission for Sustainable Agriculture (NMSA): It is the main scheme under which many subschemes are initiated including the PM Pranam scheme.
• Soil Health Card: to promote balanced and judicious use of fertilizers based on soil test
• New Urea Policy (NUP), 2015
  • Maximise indigenous urea production
  • Rationalise subsidy burden on the government
• Mission Organic Value Chain Development for North- Eastern Region (MOVCDNER),
• National Project on Organic Farming (NPOF): financial assistance to states for organic farming.
• National Centre for Organic Farming (NCOF) is involved in awareness generation & training activities for promotion of organic farming.
• Policy on Promotion of city composting
• One Nation One Fertiliser- under Bharat Brand name
• Parampargat Krishi Vikas Yojana (PKVY): Some states are making good strides with Sikkim becoming India’s first fully organic state.
  • Bhartiya Prakritik Krishi Padhati (BPKP)- subscheme centrally sponsored to improve profitability for farmers and restore soil health.
• Zero Budget Natural Farming- using natural implements for farming.
• Gobardhan scheme: Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) has approved the Market Development Assistance (MDA) to promote organic fertilizers, i.e. manure from Biogass plants.
• Innovation to Reduce Chemical Fertilizer Usage
  • Liquid Nano Urea to reduce quantity and maximise efficiency of urea.
  • Urea Gold is coating urea with sulphur so that urea is released slowly increasing absorption.
  • Neem-coated urea is use to improve nitrogen use efficiency in the soil.
• National Programme for Organic Production (NPOP), 2001: under Ministy of Commerce & Industry provides process for accreditation to agencies which can give certification for organic products. It is implemented by the Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority (APEDA).

The PM PRANAM scheme is targeting the age old problem of reducing chemical fertilizer use in a unique way. While past efforts and policies listed above have attmpted to bring reform, it is necessary that continuous awareness and on ground implementation of these policies is done in a coordinated manner to bring behavioural changes in the average Indian farmer. The government must therefore implement it by nudging farmers to make better choices in the selection of fertilisers by switching to organic fertilisers which would fetch higher prices in the export market. The government must also aim at reforming the fertiliser sector which at present is under- governed but over-regulated. The cumulative efforts would lead to a more sustainable, climate friendly, and highly remunerative agriculture in the country.