Book of Extended summaries ISDA

International Conference on Reimagining Rainfed Agro-ecosystems: Challenges &
Opportunities during 22-24, December 2022 at ICAR-CRIDA, Hyderabad
The enterprises such as dairy, fisheries, poultry, duckery, etc. were very remunerative on
account of round the year availability of economic products having higher market demand
and better market price of these commodities. Inclusion of more number of self-sustaining
enterprises can become a key for improving the farm profitability of small and marginal
holders. Thus, adoption of IFS can enhance net returns by 4.3 to 4.8 times than sole cropping.
Apart from providing higher productivity and profitability, the diversified IFS model can
provide round the year employment to the farm family along with food and nutritional
security owing to the diverse group of outputs obtained from the system. The biogas unit
integrated in the model meets the energy requirement for lighting and cooking purposes for
the farm family. This model also provides beneficial ecosystem services with the integration
of apiary and boundary plantation enterprises. The Apis mellifera aids in pollination of
different food and ornamental crops as well as trees apart from providing high value honey
and complementary products such as beeswax, royal jelly, etc. The trees included in the
boundary plantation prevent soil erosion and improves the landscape of the area. The
ecologically oriented IFS model can stabilize the agriculture landscape and also enrich the
biodiversity of the given area. IFS promotes a rich culture of biodiversity through
maintaining a multi-enterprise system of flora and fauna.
Conclusion
Livelihood, food and nutritional security have been major concern of small and marginal
farmers of India, which represent 86% of the farm families. Integrated farming system
approach can serve to fulfill these concerns since it provides employment opportunities to the
farm family round the year along with production of nutritious wholesome food. The
integration of the enterprises should be done in a complementary way so that the by-products
of one enterprise can be used effectively in another thereby enhancing the resource use
efficiency and reducing dependence on purchased off-farm inputs. The benefits of IFS are
multifold ranging from sustainability, environmental safety, conservation of resource base to
socio-economic prosperity of the small farm holders. There is a dire need to develop locationspecific
farming system models keeping in view the available resources and managerial
ability of the farmers.
References
FAO. 2017. The future of food and agriculture – Trends and challenges. Rome. ISBN 978-
92-5- 109551-5.
Solaiappan, U., Subramanian, V. and Maruthi, Sankar, G.R. 2007. Selection of suitable
integrated farming system model for rainfed semi–arid vertic Inseptisols in Tamil
Nadu. Indian J. Agron.,52(3): 194–7.
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Ecosystem based approaches for climate change adaptation, ecosystem services, integrated farming system models,
Land degradation neutrality