NEW DELHI: The Centre is set to introduce a Seed Amendment Bill to the Seeds Act in the Winter Session of parliament. Intended to be farmer-friendly, it will ensure seed traceability and hold suppliers accountable for substandard seeds, fertilisers and pesticides, which significantly affect farmers’ incomes and the country’s food security.
The decision comes after Union Minister for Agriculture and Farmers Welfare, Shivraj Singh Chouhan,received numerous complaints about the poor quality of seeds, pesticides, and fertilisers during his 15-day ‘Viksit Krishi Sankalp Abhiyan’ recently.
Chouhan stated. “The government will take strong measures to strengthen the Seed Act and implement stringent quality control mechanisms to ensure that only certified, high-quality inputs reach farmers.”
To achieve this, the government plans to enhance the current network of central and state laboratories, and mandating accreditation from the National Accreditation Board for Testing and Calibration Laboratories (NABL), which is part of the Quality Council of India. However, the country has, currently, fewer laboratories than necessary.
“Our first step is to instruct states and central agencies to obtain NABL accreditation from their own funds,” said Devesh Chaturvedi, Secretary, Agriculture and Farmers Welfare. “The testing fees for collected samples of seeds, pesticides, or fertilisers will be covered by the Central government’s Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojana,” he added.
He explained how biases in sampling would be eliminated. “Our software will randomly select the retailer’s name from which field inspectors will collect the proper samples. These samples will be packed, encoded with a QR code and sent to laboratories for testing. This will minimise manipulation and foster trust among genuine manufacturers and retailers.”
During the 15-day yatra, Chouhan claimed that departmental officials and scientists reached over 1.42 lakh villages, directly interacting with more than 1.34 crore farmers.
Chouhan listed out farmers’ concerns from the field. He underlined a huge knowledge gap between lab and lands and need to bridge existing gaps in knowledge, research, and institutional capacities to ensure tangible benefits for farmers.
“Farmers pointed out changing climate patterns impacting their crops, and they need better advice from scientists,” said Chouhan, while indicating that scientists need to spend more time in the field to help farmers how to cope with it.
Besides climate change, Chouhan also underlined that the crisis of fodder and pasture land, lack of capacity of farmers producing organisation, lack of early warning system, and stray cattle and wild animals destroying crops.
Meanwhile, Chouhan has also emphasised the strengthening of Kisan Vigyan Kendra (KVK) in every state to conduct extension work frequently. He suggested the creation of a nodal officer post that can coordinate with states-based KVKs.