ANNOUNCEMENTS
The onset of Green Revolution led to increased production of food grains due to use of ‘high-yielding variety’ of seeds, fertilizers, pesticides, better irrigation provision due to adoption of modern technology. However, it also led to continuous environmental degradation of soil as soil organic matter has declined due to overuse of fertilizers and contamination of ground water with nitrate and phosphate (Singh, 2000). In the recent times, there has been a rise in various agroecological practices in India. ‘Zero Budget Natural Farming’ is one such farming technique which was promoted by Mr. Subhash Palekar that relies on minimizing the cost from external inputs by using traditional methods. Thus, the cost of production is not actually zero but the reliance on external credit is minimal or even zero in the long run. There has been a lot of debates on the effectiveness of ZBNF in increasing the yield. Even then, there have been cases of farmers shifting to ZBNF which is surprising. This study aims to examine the various factors that motivate a farmer to shift from conventional chemical agriculture to ‘Zero Budget Natural Farming’. Firstly, important factors will be identified from literature, interviews with agricultural experts as well as farmers practicing ZBNF using a pilot. A primary survey will be conducted in Punjab using snowball sampling. ‘Categorical Principal Component Analysis’ (CATPCA) will be conducted on the data from survey to reduce the dimensionality of the data and to identify the major factors that motivate farmers to shift to ZBNF. Additionally, ‘Garret Ranking Method’ will be used to analyze the most important factors that influence a farmer’s decision of farming in line with ZBNF principles.
Key Words: Zero Budget Natural Farming, CATPCA, Garret Ranking Method.
