Promotion of Sustainable Food Systems in India through Transforming Rice-Wheat Systems in Punjab, Haryana, Odi

Objectives

To promote sustainable, integrated landscapes and efficient food value and supply chains at scale in rice- and wheat-based food systems in India.

Other

Note: Disbursement data provided is cumulative and covers disbursement made by the project Agency.

Target Groups

1. Under the project model, the delivery of improved global environmental benefits (in terms of biodiversity, climate change mitigation and sustainable land management) will be inextricably accompanied by socioeconomic co-benefits including the following: - Improved farmer incomes: in line with the target of the National Agricultural Development Plan (RKVY) to increase farmers’ incomes by 4% between 2016 and 2023, the project will improve farmers’ access to favourable markets for their products by: strengthening value chain linkages (through the Green Value Chain Development Cell, Output 2.2.1); enhancing their capacities for compliance with environmental sustainability criteria, such as those set out in the SRP Standard and third-party certification schemes (Output 2.2.3); and supporting complementary income generation options under Output 3.1.3. - Improved resilience to the volatility in economic and food systems at regional and global levels: the kinds of diversified production systems that are required to optimize GEBs also typically contribute to the resilience of farm families’ food security and livelihoods; - Improved resilience to the effects of climate change: diversified production systems capable of yielding GEBs are also typically climate-resilient, given that they contain a wide range of alternative crops and varieties and tend to foster stable micro-climates capable of buffering variations in temperature and humidity. - Improved nutritional quality: sustainable diversification away from high-yielding varieties (HYV) of rice and wheat to, for example, traditional varieties of rice, as well as other crops including vegetables, pulses and millets, will increase the availability of nutritious food both among the farmers themselves and among downstream consumers. As a co-benefit of the project, this will help to address the problems of overnutrition (and its associated health impacts including obesity and diabetes), undernutrition and anemia, which affect a significant proportion of the country’s population.