Government revises crop residue management guidelines for northern states
2 min read 01 Jul 2023, 06:21 PM ISTThe Centre and state governments will jointly provide financial support of 65% of the project cost, while the industry, as primary promoter, will contribute 25%.
PremiumNew Delhi: The Centre on Saturday said it has has revised the crop residue management guidelines for Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, and Delhi, to help tackle the challenge of stubble burning in these states and improve air quality.
As per the revised guidelines, techno-commercial pilot projects for paddy straw supply chain will be established under the bilateral agreement between the beneficiary/aggregator, such as farmers, rural entrepreneurs, cooperative societies of farmers, Farmer Producer Organisations (FPOs), and panchayats, and industries utilising the paddy straw, the agriculture ministry said in a statement.
The initiative will supplement the efforts of paddy straw management through in-situ options.
During the three-year tenure of the interventions, 1.5 million tonne (mt) of surplus paddy straw are expected to be collected, which would otherwise have been burnt in fields.
About 333 biomass collection depots of capacity 4,500 tonne will be built in Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, and Madhya Pradesh.
“Air pollution caused by stubble burning will be considerably reduced," the statement said, adding that the move will also employment opportunities of about 900,000-man days.
Also, establishment of supply chain would result in new investments in biomass to biofuel and energy sectors.
The interventions will also encourage a robust supply chain management of paddy straw, which shall further help in making paddy straw available for various end uses such as power generation, heat generation, bio- CNG, etc. by Power or bio-CNG or bio-ethanol producers.
“The government shall provide financial assistance on the capital cost of machinery and equipment," the official statement informed. “The required working capital may be financed either by the industry and beneficiary jointly or utilizing the agriculture infrastructure fund (AIF), NABARD financial or financing from the financial institutions by the beneficiary."
Project proposal based financial assistance will be extended for machines and equipment such as higher HP tractors, cutters, tedders, medium to large balers, rakers, loaders, grabbers and telehandlers which are essentially required for establishment of paddy straw supply chain.
The land for storage of the collected paddy straw will be arranged and prepared by the beneficiary as may be guided by the end use industry.
State governments will approve these projects through project sanctioning committee.
The Centre and state governments will jointly provide financial support of 65% of the project cost, while the industry, as primary promoter, will contribute 25%. Farmer or group of farmers or rural entrepreneurs or cooperative societies of farmers or FPOs, or panchayats will be direct beneficiaries of the project and will contribute the balance 10%.
