Soil Health Card Scheme (2015)

Policy Update
Akanksha Baronia

Introduction

The Soil Health Card Scheme was launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on 19 February, 2015 at Suratgarh, Rajasthan. On the occasion, the Prime Minister gave the slogan: “Swasth Dharaa, Khet Haraa.” – Healthy Earth, Green Farm. Referring to the song “ Vande Mataram”, he said that to achieve a land that is truly” Sujalam, Suphalam,” it is necessary to nurture the soil.

The scheme has been introduced to assist State Govermnets to issue soil health cards to all farmers in the country. Soil health card provides information to farmers on the nutrient status of their soil along with recommendations on the appropriate dosage of nutrients to be applied for improving soil health and its fertility.

It is one of the flagship programmes of Goverment of India, managed by the Integrated Management Division in the Ministry of Agriculture Cooperation and Farmers Welfare.

source: Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare

Functioning

Under this scheme, soil samples collected from different locations are analysed in the Soil Testing Labs as per the norms provided in the scheme’s operational guidelines.

The results are uploaded in the national Soil Health Card portal,  which has been developed for registration of soil samples, recording test results of soil samples and generation of Soil Health Cards along with fertilizer recommendations besides an information module for monitoring progress.

To issue Soil Health Cards to all 14 crore holdings in the country, about 2.53 Crore samples are to be analyzed.

The cycle is proposed to be implemented in two years, with a target of 1 Crore samples for the year 2015-16 and 1.53 Crore samples in the year 2016-17.

Benefits

1. Under the scheme, soil is tested and a formatted report is provided to farmers. So, they can decide which crops they should cultivate and which ones they should skip.
2. The authorities test the soil regularly and provide a report to farmers. So, farmers need not worry if the nature of the soil changes due to certain factors. Also, they always have updated data about their soil.
3. The work of the goverment does not stop at listing down measures required to improve the quality of the soil. In fact, Government also employs experts to help the farmers in carrying out the corrective measures.
4. Farmers get a proper soil health record, thanks to the scheme. Farmers can also study the soil management practices and plan the future of their crops and land accordingly.
5. Generally, in government schemes, the person carrying out the study for a particular farmer gets changed, but in the Soil Health Card Scheme, the govermemt is paying attention to see to it that the same person carries out soil analysis for a farmer. Such efforts are helping to enhance the effectiveness of the scheme.

Source: Soil Health Card– PIB

Achievements and Performance

1. Soil Health Cards issued: In Cycle-1(2015-17), 107348416 Soil Health Cards were issued to farmers. In Cycle-2(2017-19), 119773040 Soil Health Cards have been issued to farmers across the country.
2. Organization of demonstrations, trainings and farmer melas: Since 2015, around 6.04 lakh demonstrations, 36928 farmer trainings and 7425 farmers melas are organized/conducted under the programme. Along with state/district agriculture machinery and panchayats, village level rural development workers like Krishi Sakhis, Pasu Sakhis are involved in educating farmers on right use of fertilizers.
3. So far 6954 villages have been identified by the States in which against the target of 26.83 lakh samples, 21 lakh samples have been collected, 14.75 lakh samples analyzed and 13.59 lakh cards distributed to farmers.
4. The Goverment is also implementing the Nutrient Baed Subsidy scheme and promoting customized and fortified fertilizers for balanced use of fertilizers. So far,21 fertilizers have been brought under the NBS scheme.
5. During 2019-20, a pilot project ‘Development of Model Villages’ was taken up where soil samples collection has been taken up at individual farm holding with farmers participation instead of sample collection at grids. Under the pilot project, one village per block is adopted for holding based soil testing and organization of larger number of demonstrations up to a maximum of 50 demonstrations for each adopted village.
   

Source: Soil Health Card

Source: Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare

Impact

1. More than 90 percent of farmers surveyed reported that they have not got their soil tested before the implementation of this scheme.

source: PIB

2. As a result of application of fertilizer and micro nutrients as per the recommendations on the Soil Health Cards, it was reported that there has been a decrease of use of chemical fertilizer application in the range of 8-10 percent.
3. Overall increase in the yield of crops to the tune of 5-6 percent was reported due to application of fertilizer and micro nutrients as per recommendations available in the Soil Health Cards.

Emerging Issues

1. In 2017, researchers with the Cereal Systems Initiative for South Asia revealed several basic problems. Many complained the cards were poorly designed and not user-friendly.. The information they contained was too technical, more relevant for scientists than for farmers.
2. Many respondents were not familiar with all nutrients and micronutrients listed on the cards. For example, farmers are expected read a table with their soil’s pH, EC(electrical conductivity) and OC(organic carbon) content- all three of which were unintelligible to many farmers in the local language.
3. Not more than a handful of farmers understand the recommendations for input application, which listed the names of individual chemical nutrients rather than formulated fertilizers. This is potentially risky for farmers who may end up choosing the wrong input.

Way Forward

If farmers do not understand the content, the program adds little value. Illustrations help to overcome language barriers, and hence should be the focus of a scheme that aims to reach out to the masses.Link Soil Health Card data with platforms like eNAM, Digital India Land Records Modernization for timely updates and personalized fertilizer recommendations.

Conduct regular awareness drives, field demonstrations in training farmers regarding nutrients information.

Introduce geo-tagged soil sampling and impact tracking systems to monitor improvement in soil health, yields, and farmer incomes.

REFERENCES

PIB
https://share.google/9Y65dL1khwxrdbZXH

Soil health card pib
https://www.pib.gov.in/FactsheetDetails.aspx?Id=148602

https://dmsouthwest.delhi.gov.in/scheme/soil-health-card

About the Author

Akanksha Baronia is currently pursuing a postgraduate degree in Economics from Jawaharlal Nehru University. She is a research intern at IMPRI.

Acknowledgement

The  author sincerely thanks Aasthaba Jadeja for their valuable contribution.

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

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