Beyond the Green Revolution: Food for All and For Ever

The Green Revolution of the sixties helped to instil self-confidence in our agricultural capability and also to purchase time in relation to achieving a balance between population growth and food production. Such a revolutionary progress particularly in the production of wheat and rice became possible through synergy between technology and public policy supported by farmers’ enthusiasm generated through national demonstrations in the fields of resource poor farmers with small holdings. From the nineties onwards, there has been deceleration in the rate of growth of food production. It is widely felt that there has been a fatigue of the green revolution. Simultaneously, several enviromnental and econmnic problems hampering agricultural growth appeared. Obviously, if farm economics and ecology go wrong, nothing else will go right in agriculture…