National Mission on Natural Farming

Policy Update

Paridhi Passi

Background

India’s push toward chemical-free agriculture did not begin with this mission. It builds on the Bhartiya Prakritik Krishi Paddhati (BPKP), a sub-scheme that had been running under the Paramparagat Krishi Vikas Yojana from 2020-21 to 2022-23, and on an earlier natural farming corridor promoted along a stretch of the Ganga under the Namami Gange programme. The Union Cabinet, chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, approved the National Mission on Natural Farming (NMNF) on 25 November 2024, upgrading these earlier, smaller efforts into a standalone Centrally Sponsored Scheme under the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare. 

A standalone scheme was chosen over continuing NMNF as a sub-component of PKVY because it allowed dedicated funding, a wider target base, and a purpose-built institutional structure suited to natural farming’s specific needs, rather than sharing resources and design with organic farming more broadly. 

The mission carries a total outlay of Rs. 2,481 crore, split as Rs. 1,584 crore from the Centre and Rs. 897 crore from the states, running till the period of the 15th Finance Commission, that is, up to 2025-26. Its headline targets are considerable: reaching one crore farmers, initiating natural farming across 7.5 lakh hectares, and doing this through 15,000 clusters formed in willing Gram Panchayats. Districts with fertiliser use well above the national average, and a five-kilometre belt along the main stem of the Ganga, have been given particular priority under the scheme.

Table 1: National Mission on Natural Farming at a Glance

Source: Prime Minister’s Office, Government of India; Press Information Bureau.

Objectives

The mission’s objectives, as laid out by the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare, extend beyond input-cost reduction to soil health, livestock integration, agro-ecological research, and market-building through certification and branding.

Figure 1: Objectives of the National Mission on Natural Farming 

Source: Department of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare, Press Information Bureau 

Functioning

The mission’s core idea is to build a support ecosystem around farmers rather than simply hand out a subsidy. Since natural farming is knowledge-intensive and depends heavily on local agro-ecology, the mission relies on an extension model built around on-farm learning, hand-holding, and peer demonstration rather than one-time training alone. At the centre of this ecosystem are 10,000 need-based Bio-Input Resource Centres, which give farmers easy access to ready-to-use natural farming inputs, and roughly 2,000 model demonstration farms set up at Krishi Vigyan Kendras, agricultural universities, and practising farmers’ fields, where willing farmers can see natural farming techniques applied in practice before adopting them.

Training runs through Farmer Master Trainers and a workforce of 30,000 Krishi Sakhis and Community Resource Persons, who are responsible for awareness generation, mobilisation, and continuous handholding within each cluster. Roughly 18.75 lakh trained farmers are expected to prepare natural inputs such as Jeevamrit and Beejamrit(fermented mixtures of cow dung, urine, and other natural ingredients used respectively as a soil enricher and a seed treatment)  using their own livestock, or procure them from the Bio-Input Resource Centres.

To support adoption financially, the mission also provides an incentive of Rs. 4,000 per acre per year for two years to farmers making the transition. On the market side, the mission is building a simplified certification system and a common national branding structure for naturally grown, chemical-free produce, alongside market linkages through APMC mandis, local haats, and farmer markets, and real-time monitoring of implementation is carried out through a dedicated online portal using geo-tagged data.

Table 2: Key Institutional Components of NMNF

Source: Press Information Bureau, Government of India.

Performance

Implementation has moved at a fairly steady pace since Cabinet approval. Scheme guidelines were issued on 26 December 2024, and Annual Action Plans have since been approved for 33 states and Union Territories. In the 2024-25 financial year, Rs. 177.78 lakh was released to states and Union Territories to begin ground-level rollout. By 28 March 2025, around 70,021 Krishi Sakhis had already been trained in soil health and natural farming practices, and by 22 July 2025, more than 10 lakh farmers had been enrolled under the mission, alongside over 1,100 model farms developed and 806 training institutions engaged, including Krishi Vigyan Kendras, agricultural universities, and other natural farming institutions.

Beyond farmer enrolment, capacity building has also progressed on the training side, with more than 3,900 scientists, Farmer Master Trainers, and officials trained, and around 28,000 Community Resource Persons identified to support handholding at the cluster level.

Budget support for the mission has also grown; the Union Budget for 2025-26 raised its allocation by Rs. 516 crore compared to the previous year. States such as Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Himachal Pradesh, Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh, and Kerala have emerged as the leading adopters, having already developed successful natural farming models even before the mission’s national rollout. Set against the mission’s own targets, this places farmer enrolment at roughly 10% and model farm development at over 50% of their respective goals, showing uneven progress across different components of the mission. 

Figure 2: Progress of the National Mission on Natural Farming, as of 22 July 2025. 

Source: Department of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare, PIB. 

Table 3: Progress Against Targets

Source: Press Information Bureau, Government of India; DD India, 2025.

Emerging Issues

The gap between enrolment figures and the eventual one-crore-farmer target remains the mission’s clearest challenge; with roughly 10 lakh farmers enrolled against a target of one crore within a two-year implementation window, the pace of enrolment will need to accelerate substantially in the remaining period. Meeting the target within this timeframe would require an average enrolment pace of roughly 4-4.5 lakh farmers per month, well above the approximately 1.25 lakh farmers per month achieved so far, underscoring how significant the acceleration needed really is. 

A structural constraint often flagged around natural farming more broadly is the limited and inconsistent availability of natural inputs at the farm level, since not every farmer has the livestock, time, or labour needed to prepare inputs like Jeevamrit and Beejamrit on their own, which places heavy weight on the Bio-Input Resource Centres actually being operational and well-stocked on schedule.

Another concern is the risk of uneven adoption across states, since states with an existing natural farming culture, such as Andhra Pradesh and Himachal Pradesh, are naturally positioned to scale up faster than states with little prior exposure to the practice. Crop diversification also remains a limiting factor in many regions, since skewed Minimum Support Price incentives continue to favour cereal cultivation, making some farmers hesitant to shift away from familiar, MSP-backed crops even where natural farming techniques are otherwise viable.

Certification and branding, while planned, will also need to move quickly to give natural farming produce a genuine market premium, without which the financial incentive of Rs. 4,000 per acre may not be enough to sustain farmer interest once the two-year support period ends.

Transition-period yield dips, uncertain market demand for certified produce, and the limited current role of FPOs and digital extension tools add further pressure on the mission’s early years. 

Way Forward and Suggestions

Given the wide gap between current enrolment and the one-crore-farmer target, cluster-level enrolment drives should be intensified in states that already show strong natural farming traditions, while parallel efforts build capacity more gradually in states starting from a lower base. Ensuring that all 10,000 Bio-Input Resource Centres become genuinely operational, rather than existing only on paper, should be treated as a priority metric alongside farmer enrolment numbers, since input availability is what ultimately determines whether enrolled farmers actually sustain the practice.

As of 22 July 2025, 7,934 Bio-Input Resource Centres had been identified against the 10,000 target, but only 2,045 had actually been set up; each entrepreneur-run centre is supported through the mission’s Rs. 4,000-per-acre-per-year incentive meant to cover training, livestock upkeep, and input preparation costs during the transition period.

A public, cluster-wise dashboard tracking enrolment, Bio-Input Resource Centre operationalisation, and certification uptake would allow the mission’s own stated targets to be checked against real progress, rather than relying on periodic press releases. Speeding up the simplified certification system and common national branding would help natural farming produce command a visible market premium, giving farmers a stronger reason to continue the practice once the two-year incentive payment ends. Finally, since MSP incentives continue to favour cereal cultivation over diversified natural farming systems, closer coordination between the mission and India’s broader MSP and crop diversification policies would help remove one of the underlying disincentives working against the mission’s own goals.

References

1. Prime Minister’s Office, Government of India. (2024). Launch of National Mission on Natural Farming. https://www.pmindia.gov.in/en/news_updates/launch-of-national-mission-on-natural-farming/
2. Press Information Bureau, Government of India. (2024). Launch of National Mission on Natural Farming. https://www.pib.gov.in/PressReleasePage.aspx?PRID=2077094
3. Press Information Bureau, Government of India. (2025). National Mission on Natural Farming — Progress Note. https://www.pib.gov.in/PressNoteDetails.aspx?ModuleId=3&NoteId=155019&reg=3&lang=2
4. Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare, Government of India. (n.d.). National Mission on Natural Farming — Scheme Details. MyScheme Portal. https://www.myscheme.gov.in/schemes/nmnf
5. Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare, Government of India. (2025). Implementation of National Mission on Natural Farming. Press Information Bureau. https://www.pib.gov.in/PressReleasePage.aspx?PRID=2146937 

Acknowledgement

The author extends sincere gratitude to the IMPRI team for their invaluable guidance throughout the process.

Reviewed by:

Rathin Pathak & Shivali Yadav

Disclaimer: All views expressed in the article belong solely to the author and not necessarily to the organization.

Read more at IMPRI

Varanasi Digital Twin Project: Reimagining Urban Planning and Governance

Beyond One Crore Internships: Evaluating the Employability Impact of the Prime Minister’s Internship Scheme