Environment, Forest and Climate Change,

Text of the Speech given by Minister for Environment, Forest and Climate Change, Shri Prakash Javadekar at the Major Economies Forum in Paris today.

Excellencies,   The meeting of the MEF in Paris is going to be very crucial as all eyes are set on Paris as this city is going to be the birth place of a new climate change agreement in 2015. Let me first thank the Governments of France for hosting this important meeting before I begin with my interventions.  Our Prime Minister, Mr. Narendra Modi, who was elected with a substantial majority in the largest democratic elections in the world where 550 million people voted, sends his warm wishes to all of you. Our budget for 2014-15 was presented yesterday and we have taken a number of steps to combat climate change- (i)                 Rs 100 crores (US$ 20 million approx..) has been earmarked for National Adaptation Fund (ii)               Mission for Himalayan region has been set up (iii)             Clean Ganga River Mission has been set up (iv)             Cess on Coal has been enhanced from Rs 50 per ton to Rs 100 per ton, which would be used for cross subsidization, for clean energy and renewable energy. The Minister emphasised that we are concerned that despite being launched in 2009-10, the Green Climate Fund still has empty coffers. The need of the hour is the quick capitalisation as climate actions cannot wait. The Initial Resource Mobilisation (IRM) meeting in Oslo has hardly produced any result. The capitalization of the Green Climate Fund should be facilitated majorly by public financing in grant terms. Many countries are emphasizing on private sector investment & climate investment as panacea for all ills. However in our view the private sector can complement but not supplant public finance needed to address climate change and its impacts. According to the Minister the Green Climate Fund should be capitalised by 2015. This requires countries to agree to a road map for achieving this.  We cannot reclassify Overseas Development Assistance (ODA) as climate finance. This would have critical bearing on the pre-2020 and the post 2020 climate agenda. On the Role of finance post-2020, the Minister indicated that the probability of many developing countries submitting their INDCs will be very low if the developed countries do not commit substantial amount of climate finance upfront before September 2014 to fund the requirements likely to be depicted in the INDCs and bring it to the notice of the Heads of State of the developing countries.  Let me reiterate here that the issue of   climate finance and commitment thereof in substantial amount by the developed countries is an essential prerequisite for eliciting carefully prepared information on INDCs from the developing countries. He made the concrete suggestion that part of GCF should be used for financing critical technologies and purchase of IPRs and making them available to developing countries free of cost. Many Countries like UK, US, Australia, Canada, France, Russia, Germany, S.Africa, Brazil, Peru, Italy, Mexico, Indonesia, China, Singapore, Korea, Tanzania, Turkey, Poland and S. Arabia congratulated and appreciated the new Indian Government and expressed interest in working with it.

Revamp of DRDO and Defence PSUs

A Committee headed by Dr. P. Rama Rao was constituted by the Government for reviewing the functioning of Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO). The Organisation has implemented the following recommendations of the Committee within its powers: • Nomination of Nodal Officers for structured interaction between DRDO and Services. • Introduction of Integrated Financial Advice (IFA) Scheme for financial decentralization. • Appointment of a dedicated Chief Controller for Human Resources (HR). • Creation of Seven Technology Domain based Clusters headed by Director’s General, Restructuring of DRDO HQrs, Creation of Directorate of Systems Analysis and Modelling (SAM) and Directorate of Quality, Reliability and Safety (QR&S). • Efforts have also been made to increase budget for Extramural Research as recommended by the Committee. Note has been initiated by DRDO for approval of the Cabinet for: • Creation of empowered Defence Technology Commission (DTC). • Creation of a Commercial Arm of DRDO. • Renaming of Director General, DRDO as Chairman, DRDO. • Creation of 5 Senior Administrative Grade (SAG) posts alongwith 162 other posts for full scale implementation of IFA Scheme. At present, there is no proposal to revamp the Defence Public Sector Undertakings (DPSUs) to make them capable for developing advance weapons systems. The DPSUs have a strategy for strengthening their capabilities for producing and supplying various Weapon Systems and Platforms required by Defence Forces within the agreed timeframe. Some of the DPSUs have also collaborated with DRDO and other R&D institutions in this regard. With the objective of achieving self-reliance in defence production, the Ordnance Factories and DPSUs have been continuously modernizing and upgrading their capabilities and widening their product range. Adequate resources have been made available by the government to DRDO for carrying out research and development works. Government continuously monitors the capacity utilization of DPSUs and emphasis is given for augmentation and modernization of their capacities to meet the growing demand of the Armed Forces.

Measures to Check Food Inflation

In order to check food inflation during the current year 2014-15from, Government has released additional 66.45 lakh tons of foodgrains from  Central Pool to States/Union Territories (UTs) for distribution at BPL rates and APL rate under Targeted Public Distribution System (TPDS) and  7.11 lakh tons of foodgrains for festivals, calamity relief, additional requirement under TPDS, etc.  This is in addition to the provisional allotment of 483.30 lakh tons of foodgrains made to States/UTs under normal TPDS allocation, including the allocation under National Food Security Act.  This information was given by the Minister of Statefor Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution, Shri Raosaheb Patil Danve in a written reply in Rajya Sabha today.  He said that Central Government has authorized State Governments to impose levy for rice on millers/dealers and various State Governments have been imposing levy to varying extent ranging from 25% to 75%.  Delegation of powers given to the State Governments has now been restricted by the Central Government to limit the imposition of levy on the millers/dealers to the maximum extent of 25%.                          Details of other steps taken by the Government to contain the price rise of essential commodities are as follows: ·        Reduced import duties to zero – for wheat, onion and pulses. ·        Banned export of edible oils (except coconut oil, forest based oil and edible oils in blended consumer packs up to 5 kg with a Minimum Export price of USD 1500 per MT) and pulses (except Kabuli chana and organic pulses and lentils up to a maximum of 10000 tonnes per annum). ·        Imposed stock limits form time to time in the case of select essential commodities such as pulses, edible oil, and edible oilseeds for a period up to 30.9.2014 and in respect of paddy and rice up to 30.11.2014. ·        Maintained the Central Issue Price (CIP) for rice (at Rs.5.65 per kg for BPL and Rs 3 per kg for AAY) and wheat (at Rs. 4.15 per kg for BPL and Rs 2 per kg for AAY) since 2002. ·        Suspended Futures trading in rice, Urad and Tur. ·        Fixed Minimum Export Price (MEP) of USD 300 for onion w.e.f. 17.6.2014 and increased to USD 500 w.e.f. 2.7.2014. ·        Fixed Minimum Export Price (MEP) of USD 450 for potato w.e.f. 26.6.2014. ·        Imposed stock holding limits on Onions & Potatos under Essential Commodities Act and empowering State Governments to impose limits on stocking of these vegetables by traders w.e.f  03.07.2014. ·        States advised to allow free movement of fruits and vegetables by delisting them from APMC Act. ·        Government has approved the release of additional five million tonnes of Rice to BPL & APL families in states pending implementation of National Food Security Act (NFSA). ·        The Government is also implementing “The Essential Commodities Act 1955” and “The Prevention of Black Marketing and Maintenance of Supplies of Essential Commodities Act, 1980” with the objective of preventing hoarding and black marketing of essential commodities. Issued advisory to State Governments to take effective action against hoarding & black marketing under the Essential Commodities Act 1955 & the PBMMSEC Act 1980

Agriculture Gets High Focus in Union Budget Proposals Include New Agri Universities, Soil Health Card to Every Farmer, Kisan TV Channel and Raising of Farm Credit Target to Rs. 8 Lakh crore

The union budget presented by Shri Arun Jaitley, Minister of Finance, yesterday has a number of proposals relating to agriculture. The major proposals are as follows: EXPANSION OF EDUCATIONAL AND R&D INFRASTRUCTURE Government will establish two institutions of excellence in Assam and Jharkhand with an initial sum of `100 crore in the current financial year. In addition, an amount of Rs.100 crores is being set aside for setting up an “Agri-Tech Infrastructure Fund”. It is also proposed to establish Agriculture Universities in Andhra Pradesh and Rajasthan and Horticulture Universities in Telangana and Haryana. An initial sum of Rs.200 crores has been allocated for this purpose. SOIL HEALTH Deteriorating soil health has been a cause of concern and leads to sub optimal utilization of farming resources. Government will initiate a scheme to provide to every farmer a soil health card in a Mission mode. A sum of Rs.100 crore has been kept for this purpose and an additional Rs.56 crores to set up 100 Mobile Soil Testing Laboratories across the country. MEASURES TO HELP FARMERS IN GETTING CREDIT AND REMUNERATIVE PRICES As a very large number of landless farmers are unable to provide land title as guarantee, institutional finance is denied to them and they become vulnerable to money lenders’ usurious lending. The Finance Minister has proposed to provide finance to 5 lakh joint farming groups of “Bhoomi Heen Kisan” through NABARD in the current financial year. Price volatility in the agriculture produce creates uncertainties and hardship for the farmers. To mitigate this a sum of Rs.500 crore has been provided for establishing a Price Stabilization Fund. The farmers and consumers’ interest will be further served by increasing competition and integrating markets across the country. To accelerate setting up of a National Market, the Central Government will work closely with the State Governments to re-orient their respective APMC Acts., to provide for establishment of private market yards/ private markets. The state governments will also be encouraged to develop Farmers’ Markets in town areas to enable the farmers to sell their produce directly. The issue of profitability of small holding based agriculture has assumed importance in view of increasing proportion of small and marginal farmers in the country. I propose to supplement NABARD’s Producers’ organization development fund for Producer’s development and upliftment called PRODUCE with a sum of Rs.200 crore which will be utilized for building 2,000 producers organizations across the country over the next two years. IMPARTING GROWTH AND SUSTAINABILITY The Finance Minister said, we are committed to sustaining a growth of 4% in Agriculture and for this we will bring technology driven second green revolution with focus on higher productivity and include “Protein revolution” as an area of major focus. Climate change is a reality which all of us have to face together. Agriculture as an activity is most prone to the vagaries of climate change. To meet this challenge, a “National Adaptation Fund” for climate change will be established. As an initial sum an amount of `100 crore will be transferred to the Fund. North Eastern Region of India has tremendous potential for development of organic farming. With a growing global demand for organic food, people living in the NE states can reap rich harvest from development of commercial organic farming. To facilitate this, the budget  provides a sum of Rs.100 crore for this purpose in the current financial year. FARM CREDIT Banks are providing strong credit support to the agriculture sector. A target of Rs.8 lakh crore has been set for agriculture credit during 2014-15. Under the Interest Subvention Scheme for short term crop loans, the banks are extending loans to farmers at a concessional rate of 7%. The farmers get a further incentive of 3% for timely repayment. This scheme will continue in 2014-15. The share of long term investment credit in agriculture is going down as compared to short term crop loan. This is severely hampering the asset creation in agriculture and allied activities. In order to give a boost to long term investment credit in agriculture, the budget provides for setting up “Long Term Rural Credit Fund” in NABARD for the purpose of providing refinance support to Cooperative Banks and Regional Rural Banks with an initial corpus of Rs.5,000 crore. The Short Term Cooperative Rural Credit (STCRC) – Refinance Fund was announced in Union Budget 2008-09 with initial corpus of Rs.5,000 crore. In order to ensure increased and uninterrupted credit flow to farmers and to avoid high cost market borrowings by NABARD, an amount of `50,000 crore has been provided for STCRC Fund during 2014-15. DEVELOPMENT OF INDIGENOUS CATTLE BREEDS A sum of Rs.50 crores for the development of indigenous cattle breeds and an equal amount for starting a blue revolution in inland fisheries. BUILDING RURAL AND AGRICULTURAL  INFRASTRUCTURE NABARD operates the Rural Infrastructure Development Fund (RIDF), out of the priority sector lending shortfall of the banks, which helps in creation of infrastructure in agriculture and rural sectors across the country. The budget provides for raising the corpus of RIDF by an additional Rs.5,000 crores from the target given in the Interim Budget to Rs.25,000 crores in the current financial year. Increasing warehousing capacity for increasing the shelf life of agriculture produces and thereby the earning capacity of the farmers is of utmost importance. Keeping in view the urgent need for availability of scientific warehousing infrastructure in the country, I propose an allocation of Rs.5,000 crore for the fund for the year 2014-15. KISAN TV Kisan TV, dedicated to the interests of the agriculture and allied sector will be launched in the current financial year. This will disseminate real time information to the farmers information regarding new farming techniques, water conservation, organic farming etc. A sum of Rs.100 crore has been kept for this purpose. OTHER BUDGET MEASURES WITH BEARING ON AGRICULTURE The nascent agri-biotech cluster in Mohali will be scaled up to include plant-genetic and phenotype platforms. Secondary agriculture will be a major thrust in Mohali through collaborations in the public and private sector. In addition, two new clusters, in Pune and Kolkata will be established. At the request of the Ministry of Agriculture, The Finance Ministry has exempted service tax on loading, unloading, storage, warehousing and transportation of cotton, whether ginned or baled, to bring it on par with certain other agricultural produce. The Finance Minister said, wage employment would be provided under MGNREGA through works that are more productive, asset creating and substantially linked to agriculture and allied activities

Agriculture Gets High Focus in Union Budget

Proposals Include New Agri Universities, Soil Health Card to Every Farmer, Kisan TV Channel and Raising of Farm Credit Target to Rs. 8 Lakh crore

The union budget presented by Shri Arun Jaitley, Minister of Finance, yesterday has a number of proposals relating to agriculture. The major proposals are as follows: EXPANSION OF EDUCATIONAL AND R&D INFRASTRUCTURE Government will establish two institutions of excellence in Assam and Jharkhand with an initial sum of `100 crore in the current financial year. In addition, an amount of Rs.100 crores is being set aside for setting up an “Agri-Tech Infrastructure Fund”. It is also proposed to establish Agriculture Universities in Andhra Pradesh and Rajasthan and Horticulture Universities in Telangana and Haryana. An initial sum of Rs.200 crores has been allocated for this purpose. SOIL HEALTH Deteriorating soil health has been a cause of concern and leads to sub optimal utilization of farming resources. Government will initiate a scheme to provide to every farmer a soil health card in a Mission mode. A sum of Rs.100 crore has been kept for this purpose and an additional Rs.56 crores to set up 100 Mobile Soil Testing Laboratories across the country. MEASURES TO HELP FARMERS IN GETTING CREDIT AND REMUNERATIVE PRICES As a very large number of landless farmers are unable to provide land title as guarantee, institutional finance is denied to them and they become vulnerable to money lenders’ usurious lending. The Finance Minister has proposed to provide finance to 5 lakh joint farming groups of “Bhoomi Heen Kisan” through NABARD in the current financial year. Price volatility in the agriculture produce creates uncertainties and hardship for the farmers. To mitigate this a sum of Rs.500 crore has been provided for establishing a Price Stabilization Fund. The farmers and consumers’ interest will be further served by increasing competition and integrating markets across the country. To accelerate setting up of a National Market, the Central Government will work closely with the State Governments to re-orient their respective APMC Acts., to provide for establishment of private market yards/ private markets. The state governments will also be encouraged to develop Farmers’ Markets in town areas to enable the farmers to sell their produce directly. The issue of profitability of small holding based agriculture has assumed importance in view of increasing proportion of small and marginal farmers in the country. I propose to supplement NABARD’s Producers’ organization development fund for Producer’s development and upliftment called PRODUCE with a sum of Rs.200 crore which will be utilized for building 2,000 producers organizations across the country over the next two years. IMPARTING GROWTH AND SUSTAINABILITY The Finance Minister said, we are committed to sustaining a growth of 4% in Agriculture and for this we will bring technology driven second green revolution with focus on higher productivity and include “Protein revolution” as an area of major focus. Climate change is a reality which all of us have to face together. Agriculture as an activity is most prone to the vagaries of climate change. To meet this challenge, a “National Adaptation Fund” for climate change will be established. As an initial sum an amount of `100 crore will be transferred to the Fund. North Eastern Region of India has tremendous potential for development of organic farming. With a growing global demand for organic food, people living in the NE states can reap rich harvest from development of commercial organic farming. To facilitate this, the budget  provides a sum of Rs.100 crore for this purpose in the current financial year. FARM CREDIT Banks are providing strong credit support to the agriculture sector. A target of Rs.8 lakh crore has been set for agriculture credit during 2014-15. Under the Interest Subvention Scheme for short term crop loans, the banks are extending loans to farmers at a concessional rate of 7%. The farmers get a further incentive of 3% for timely repayment. This scheme will continue in 2014-15. The share of long term investment credit in agriculture is going down as compared to short term crop loan. This is severely hampering the asset creation in agriculture and allied activities. In order to give a boost to long term investment credit in agriculture, the budget provides for setting up “Long Term Rural Credit Fund” in NABARD for the purpose of providing refinance support to Cooperative Banks and Regional Rural Banks with an initial corpus of Rs.5,000 crore. The Short Term Cooperative Rural Credit (STCRC) – Refinance Fund was announced in Union Budget 2008-09 with initial corpus of Rs.5,000 crore. In order to ensure increased and uninterrupted credit flow to farmers and to avoid high cost market borrowings by NABARD, an amount of `50,000 crore has been provided for STCRC Fund during 2014-15. DEVELOPMENT OF INDIGENOUS CATTLE BREEDS A sum of Rs.50 crores for the development of indigenous cattle breeds and an equal amount for starting a blue revolution in inland fisheries. BUILDING RURAL AND AGRICULTURAL  INFRASTRUCTURE NABARD operates the Rural Infrastructure Development Fund (RIDF), out of the priority sector lending shortfall of the banks, which helps in creation of infrastructure in agriculture and rural sectors across the country. The budget provides for raising the corpus of RIDF by an additional Rs.5,000 crores from the target given in the Interim Budget to Rs.25,000 crores in the current financial year. Increasing warehousing capacity for increasing the shelf life of agriculture produces and thereby the earning capacity of the farmers is of utmost importance. Keeping in view the urgent need for availability of scientific warehousing infrastructure in the country, I propose an allocation of Rs.5,000 crore for the fund for the year 2014-15. KISAN TV Kisan TV, dedicated to the interests of the agriculture and allied sector will be launched in the current financial year. This will disseminate real time information to the farmers information regarding new farming techniques, water conservation, organic farming etc. A sum of Rs.100 crore has been kept for this purpose. OTHER BUDGET MEASURES WITH BEARING ON AGRICULTURE The nascent agri-biotech cluster in Mohali will be scaled up to include plant-genetic and phenotype platforms. Secondary agriculture will be a major thrust in Mohali through collaborations in the public and private sector. In addition, two new clusters, in Pune and Kolkata will be established. At the request of the Ministry of Agriculture, The Finance Ministry has exempted service tax on loading, unloading, storage, warehousing and transportation of cotton, whether ginned or baled, to bring it on par with certain other agricultural produce. The Finance Minister said, wage employment would be provided under MGNREGA through works that are more productive, asset creating and substantially linked to agriculture and allied activities

Agriculture Gets High Focus in Union Budget

Proposals Include New Agri Universities, Soil Health Card to Every Farmer, Kisan TV Channel and Raising of Farm Credit Target to Rs. 8 Lakh crore

The union budget presented by Shri Arun Jaitley, Minister of Finance, yesterday has a number of proposals relating to agriculture. The major proposals are as follows: EXPANSION OF EDUCATIONAL AND R&D INFRASTRUCTURE Government will establish two institutions of excellence in Assam and Jharkhand with an initial sum of `100 crore in the current financial year. In addition, an amount of Rs.100 crores is being set aside for setting up an “Agri-Tech Infrastructure Fund”. It is also proposed to establish Agriculture Universities in Andhra Pradesh and Rajasthan and Horticulture Universities in Telangana and Haryana. An initial sum of Rs.200 crores has been allocated for this purpose. SOIL HEALTH Deteriorating soil health has been a cause of concern and leads to sub optimal utilization of farming resources. Government will initiate a scheme to provide to every farmer a soil health card in a Mission mode. A sum of Rs.100 crore has been kept for this purpose and an additional Rs.56 crores to set up 100 Mobile Soil Testing Laboratories across the country. MEASURES TO HELP FARMERS IN GETTING CREDIT AND REMUNERATIVE PRICES As a very large number of landless farmers are unable to provide land title as guarantee, institutional finance is denied to them and they become vulnerable to money lenders’ usurious lending. The Finance Minister has proposed to provide finance to 5 lakh joint farming groups of “Bhoomi Heen Kisan” through NABARD in the current financial year. Price volatility in the agriculture produce creates uncertainties and hardship for the farmers. To mitigate this a sum of Rs.500 crore has been provided for establishing a Price Stabilization Fund. The farmers and consumers’ interest will be further served by increasing competition and integrating markets across the country. To accelerate setting up of a National Market, the Central Government will work closely with the State Governments to re-orient their respective APMC Acts., to provide for establishment of private market yards/ private markets. The state governments will also be encouraged to develop Farmers’ Markets in town areas to enable the farmers to sell their produce directly. The issue of profitability of small holding based agriculture has assumed importance in view of increasing proportion of small and marginal farmers in the country. I propose to supplement NABARD’s Producers’ organization development fund for Producer’s development and upliftment called PRODUCE with a sum of Rs.200 crore which will be utilized for building 2,000 producers organizations across the country over the next two years. IMPARTING GROWTH AND SUSTAINABILITY The Finance Minister said, we are committed to sustaining a growth of 4% in Agriculture and for this we will bring technology driven second green revolution with focus on higher productivity and include “Protein revolution” as an area of major focus. Climate change is a reality which all of us have to face together. Agriculture as an activity is most prone to the vagaries of climate change. To meet this challenge, a “National Adaptation Fund” for climate change will be established. As an initial sum an amount of `100 crore will be transferred to the Fund. North Eastern Region of India has tremendous potential for development of organic farming. With a growing global demand for organic food, people living in the NE states can reap rich harvest from development of commercial organic farming. To facilitate this, the budget  provides a sum of Rs.100 crore for this purpose in the current financial year. FARM CREDIT Banks are providing strong credit support to the agriculture sector. A target of Rs.8 lakh crore has been set for agriculture credit during 2014-15. Under the Interest Subvention Scheme for short term crop loans, the banks are extending loans to farmers at a concessional rate of 7%. The farmers get a further incentive of 3% for timely repayment. This scheme will continue in 2014-15. The share of long term investment credit in agriculture is going down as compared to short term crop loan. This is severely hampering the asset creation in agriculture and allied activities. In order to give a boost to long term investment credit in agriculture, the budget provides for setting up “Long Term Rural Credit Fund” in NABARD for the purpose of providing refinance support to Cooperative Banks and Regional Rural Banks with an initial corpus of Rs.5,000 crore. The Short Term Cooperative Rural Credit (STCRC) – Refinance Fund was announced in Union Budget 2008-09 with initial corpus of Rs.5,000 crore. In order to ensure increased and uninterrupted credit flow to farmers and to avoid high cost market borrowings by NABARD, an amount of `50,000 crore has been provided for STCRC Fund during 2014-15. DEVELOPMENT OF INDIGENOUS CATTLE BREEDS A sum of Rs.50 crores for the development of indigenous cattle breeds and an equal amount for starting a blue revolution in inland fisheries. BUILDING RURAL AND AGRICULTURAL  INFRASTRUCTURE NABARD operates the Rural Infrastructure Development Fund (RIDF), out of the priority sector lending shortfall of the banks, which helps in creation of infrastructure in agriculture and rural sectors across the country. The budget provides for raising the corpus of RIDF by an additional Rs.5,000 crores from the target given in the Interim Budget to Rs.25,000 crores in the current financial year. Increasing warehousing capacity for increasing the shelf life of agriculture produces and thereby the earning capacity of the farmers is of utmost importance. Keeping in view the urgent need for availability of scientific warehousing infrastructure in the country, I propose an allocation of Rs.5,000 crore for the fund for the year 2014-15. KISAN TV Kisan TV, dedicated to the interests of the agriculture and allied sector will be launched in the current financial year. This will disseminate real time information to the farmers information regarding new farming techniques, water conservation, organic farming etc. A sum of Rs.100 crore has been kept for this purpose. OTHER BUDGET MEASURES WITH BEARING ON AGRICULTURE The nascent agri-biotech cluster in Mohali will be scaled up to include plant-genetic and phenotype platforms. Secondary agriculture will be a major thrust in Mohali through collaborations in the public and private sector. In addition, two new clusters, in Pune and Kolkata will be established. At the request of the Ministry of Agriculture, The Finance Ministry has exempted service tax on loading, unloading, storage, warehousing and transportation of cotton, whether ginned or baled, to bring it on par with certain other agricultural produce. The Finance Minister said, wage employment would be provided under MGNREGA through works that are more productive, asset creating and substantially linked to agriculture and allied activities

Promoting Soil Health and Judicious use of Fertilizers

Soil health needs to be assessed at regular intervals so as to ensure that farmers apply the required amount of nutrients to their crops. Accordingly, distribution of Soil Health Cards is a continuous & dynamic exercise carried out by the State Governments. Central Government provides assistance to State Governments for setting up Soil Testing Laboratories for issuing Soil Health Cards to farmers. State Governments have adopted innovative practices like involvement of agricultural students, NGOs and private sector in soil testing, determining average soil health of villages, etc., to issue Soil Health Cards. Government has taken up Management of Soil Health & Fertility under National Mission for Sustainable Agriculture to promote soil test based balanced and judicious use of fertilizers. The scheme provides assistance for setting up new static/mobile soil testing laboratories (STLs), strengthening of existing STLs, training of STL Staff/ extension officers/ farmers, field demonstrations on balanced use of fertilizers etc. For judicious use of fertilisers, Indian Council of Agriculture Research (ICAR) advocates split application and placement of fertilisers, use of slow releasing N-fertilizers and nitrification inhibitors, growing leguminous crops and use of Resource Conservation Technologies. ICAR has developed technologies for preparation of enriched / vermi compost from various organic wastes, developed improved strains of biofertilisers specific to different crops and soil types, and prepared geo-referenced soil fertility maps of 171 districts which are useful in monitoring soil fertility and fertiliser recommendations for balanced nutrient application. Government has launched Mission for Integrated Development of Horticulture (MIDH) from 2014-15, wherein a component of integrated area expansion has been included for enabling farmers to take up area expansion activities along with drip irrigation. Assistance is also extended for creation of water resources that is community and individual tanks. Apart from above, ICAR provides technology support for enhancing irrigation efficiency through laser levelling, optimal basin sizes and shift to micro irrigation techniques, optimal irrigation scheduling, augmenting water supplies through rain water harvesting for supplementary irrigation, etc.