TY - JOUR
T1 - The Top 100 questions for the sustainable intensification of agriculture in India's rainfed drylands
AU - Bharucha, Zareen Pervez
AU - Attwood, Simon
AU - Badiger, Shrinivas
AU - Balamatti, Arun
AU - Bawden, Richard
AU - Bentley, Jeffery W.
AU - Chander, Mahesh
AU - Davies, Leonora
AU - Dixon, Harry
AU - Dixon, John
AU - D'Souza, Marcella
AU - Butler Flora, Cornelia
AU - Green, Michael
AU - Joshi, Deepa
AU - Komarek, Adam M.
AU - McDermid, Lesley Ruth
AU - Mathijs, Erik
AU - Rola, Agnes C.
AU - Patnaik, Sasmita
AU - Pattanayak, Sandip
AU - Pingali, Prabhu
AU - Prasad, V. P. Vara
AU - Rabbinge, Rudy
AU - Ramanjaneyulu, G. V.
AU - Ravindranath, N. H.
AU - Sage, Colin
AU - Saha, Amrita
AU - Salvatore, Ceccarelli
AU - Saxena, Lopamudra Patnaik
AU - Singh, Chandni
AU - Smith, Pete
AU - Srinidhi, Arjuna
AU - Sugam, Rudresh
AU - Thomas, Richard
AU - Uphoff, Norman
AU - Pretty, Jules
N1 - Acknowledgements
We extend grateful thanks to all the colleagues who have responded thoughtfully to our call for questions and canvassed their professional networks to ensure input from a wide range of stakeholders. The lead author extends thanks to Anglia Ruskin University for supporting two Undergraduate placements, providing essential research assistance for the project. The authors thank anonymous reviewers for their comments on the paper, which have significantly strengthened the manuscript.
PY - 2021
Y1 - 2021
N2 - India has the largest area of rainfed dryland agriculture globally, with a variety of distinct types of farming systems producing most of its coarse cereals, food legumes, minor millets, and large amounts of livestock. All these are vital for national and regional food and nutritional security. Yet, the rainfed drylands have been relatively neglected in mainstream agricultural and rural development policy. As a result, significant social-ecological challenges overlap in these landscapes: endemic poverty, malnutrition and land degradation. Sustainable intensification of dryland agriculture is essential for helping to address these challenges, particularly in the context of accelerating climate change. In this paper, we present 100 questions that point to the most important knowledge gaps and research priorities. If addressed, these would facilitate and inform sustainable intensification in Indian rainfed drylands, leading to improved agricultural production and enhanced ecosystem services. The horizon scanning method used to produce these questions brought together experts and practitioners involved in a broad range of disciplines and sectors. This exercise resulted in a consolidated set of questions covering the agricultural drylands, organized into 13 themes. Together, these represent a collective programme for new cross- and multi-disciplinary research on sustainable intensification in the Indian rainfed drylands.
AB - India has the largest area of rainfed dryland agriculture globally, with a variety of distinct types of farming systems producing most of its coarse cereals, food legumes, minor millets, and large amounts of livestock. All these are vital for national and regional food and nutritional security. Yet, the rainfed drylands have been relatively neglected in mainstream agricultural and rural development policy. As a result, significant social-ecological challenges overlap in these landscapes: endemic poverty, malnutrition and land degradation. Sustainable intensification of dryland agriculture is essential for helping to address these challenges, particularly in the context of accelerating climate change. In this paper, we present 100 questions that point to the most important knowledge gaps and research priorities. If addressed, these would facilitate and inform sustainable intensification in Indian rainfed drylands, leading to improved agricultural production and enhanced ecosystem services. The horizon scanning method used to produce these questions brought together experts and practitioners involved in a broad range of disciplines and sectors. This exercise resulted in a consolidated set of questions covering the agricultural drylands, organized into 13 themes. Together, these represent a collective programme for new cross- and multi-disciplinary research on sustainable intensification in the Indian rainfed drylands.
KW - Drylands
KW - India
KW - rainfed agriculture
KW - sustainable intensification
U2 - 10.1080/14735903.2020.1830530
DO - 10.1080/14735903.2020.1830530
M3 - Article
SN - 1473-5903
VL - 19
SP - 106
EP - 127
JO - International Journal of Agricultural Sustainability
JF - International Journal of Agricultural Sustainability
IS - 2
ER -
