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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | India's water problem has a simple solution -Mihir Shah

India's water problem has a simple solution -Mihir Shah

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published Published on Aug 15, 2019   modified Modified on Aug 15, 2019
-The Indian Express

Reducing its use in agriculture is the most effective way of solving India’s water problem.

Spiritual teachers tell us that if we stay calm in the face of a crisis, our response is more likely to be meaningful, effective and sustainable. Like good scientists, they also advise us to maintain a clear and steady view of the facts of the situation, and then act accordingly. Those trying to solve India’s water crisis would do well to keep these pieces of wisdom in mind.

That will help avoid resorting to gigantic Stalinist projects like the interlinking of rivers or needlessly expensive options like desalination. For there is no future in desperately and endlessly trying to increase the supply of water. Luckily, there are simple solutions on the demand side, which have not even been looked at. The formation of the Jal Shakti ministry is, indeed, a promising step in the right direction. Hopefully, the prime minister will provide greater substance to this initiative in his Independence Day speech.

The single largest fact about India’s water is that 90 per cent of it is consumed in farming. And that 80 per cent of this irrigation is for water-guzzling crops — rice, wheat and sugarcane. Reducing this number is the most effective way of solving India’s water problem. But can we do this without hurting our farmers, who are already in so much distress? Yes, we can. Indeed, it turns out that the solutions to India’s water crisis and that of the farmers, lie in the very same direction.

India’s farmers, even in drought-prone areas, grow these water-intensive crops because these are the crops that have a steady demand. Governments, over the past 50 years, have primarily procured wheat and rice. And, sugarcane is bought by sugar factories. If we diversify our procurement operations, to include less water-intensive crops, like millets, pulses and oilseeds, especially in India’s drylands, farmers would have the incentive to grow them. But what will we do with these crops after procurement? Again, there is a simple answer: Introduce them in the mid-day meal scheme and the integrated child development services, which are the largest child nutrition programmes in human history. This would create an enormous and steady demand for these crops and farmers in the regions where it is ecologically appropriate to grow them would be incentivised to shift away from water-intensive crops.

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The Indian Express, 15 August, 2019, https://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/lets-draw-lines-in-water-crisis-farmer-deaths-drought-5905972/?fbclid=IwAR3JGoFOsoq4PHu5n70Gg6Fm0Bz3GTReg1d0MvVs0


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