New Delhi: Around 41 percent of small and marginal farmers in India have reported that extreme weather conditions — drought, excessive or non-seasonal rains, and floods — have had an adverse impact on their cropping cycle, a report by Forum of Enterprises for Equitable Development (FEED), in collaboration with Development Intelligence Unit (DIU), said.
FEED is an organisation that advocates for marginal farmers, whike DIU is a data driven insights and research firm.
Titled ‘Impact of Climate Change on Marginal Farmers’, the report shows a cumulative trend over the past five years of a higher proportion of farmers losing at least one-third to half their crops due to extreme climatic conditions.
The study found that 50 percent of paddy farmers and over 40 percent of wheat farmers losing more than half their crops has been a consistent trend over the past five years.
For other crops, a loss of over 50 percent had been reported by 45-65 percent of the farmers.
Only about 10 percent of farmers consistently reported no crop loss due to such weather events.
While farmers have adapted to extreme temperatures, over half report losing 50 percent or more of their crops to excessive rains, prolonged winters, droughts, and floods. Crop losses are observed across all types and seasons, with slightly lower incidence during the Zaid cropping season.
Moreover, over half the farmers reported losses in staple crops.
The report was released Tuesday at the India International Centre in Delhi on Tuesday and was followed by a panel discussion.
Speaking during the discussion, Samuel Praveen Kumar, Joint Secretary of the Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare (MoAFW), emphasised the critical dependence of farmers on rainfall. He stated, “Monsoon meeting the ground is his (farmer’s) livelihood. The maximum number of calls the Kisan Call Centre receives is the farmer inquiring about the weather.”
The study covered 6,615 marginal farmers across 21 states. In India, marginal farmers are those with up to 1 hectare of agricultural land and who own or cultivate up to one hectare of agricultural land, as a landowner, sharecropper, or tenant.
The farmers were interviewed via telephone and respondents were selected after determining their land holding size through tele-calling. A majority of the respondents were cultivating their own land, while around one in six were sharecroppers (where a landowner allows a sharecropper to use the land either for a fixed rent or in return for a share of the crops produced on that land).
In India, the figures reveal that a majority of farmers cultivate their own land, with about one-sixth being sharecroppers. Only 14.4 percent have received formal agricultural training, while most rely on generational knowledge. The study examined farmers’ engagement across cropping seasons: Kharif (June-October), Rabi (November-April/May), and Zaid (March-June).
Approximately one-third farm only during Kharif, while a slightly higher percentage work in both Kharif and Rabi seasons. Of those farming two seasons, 95 percent choose Kharif and Rabi. Just 7 percent of marginal farmers cultivate across all three seasons.
Farmers starting to engage in part-time occupations
The report also indicated limited year-round irrigation access. Just over 10 percent of the interviewed marginal farmers rely solely on monsoon rains and do not use irrigation water at all, it found.
Among those who do use irrigation, there is a notable difference in usage patterns between those who reported being impacted by climate change and those who did not.
The report also found that custom hiring centres (CHCs), which offer farm machinery for rent, are not readily available to most small-scale farmers. Two-thirds of those interviewed reported no CHC within 10 km of their village and among those who do have a CHC nearby, only 14.4 percent had ever hired equipment from these centres.
Moreover, nearly 83 percent of marginal farmers surveyed reported receiving government grants or subsidies, primarily through the PM-Kisan Samman Nidhi scheme, which were directly deposited into their bank accounts.
The 2016 agriculture census records 14.64 crore agricultural households in India, regardless of holding size. According to the Press Information Bureau (PIB), as of the 2023-24 fiscal year, the PM Kisan Samman Nidhi programme covers 107.1 million farmers, accounting for 73.15 percent of the total farming population.
Over 20 percent of marginal farmers using agriculture-related advisory services encountered no obstacles in implementing the advice received. However, figures show one in four faced challenges, including financial constraints, lack of available inputs or physical resources in their areas, and insufficient follow-up technical support.
It is evident that a significant number of farmers in villages affected by adverse climatic events have had to diversify or change their farm-dependent livelihoods, with many turning towards part-time occupations, animal husbandry, or resorting to temporary migration for wage labour.
Farmers have also turned to growing stress-tolerant crops, adjusting planting dates, and adopting soil and water conservation techniques. Almost 70 percent of marginal farmers have changed their sowing methods, while many have adopted disease management strategies and water management practices.
However, the adoption of climate-resilient agricultural (CRA) practices faces significant challenges. Around 13.4 percent reported no constraints, a majority struggling with high up-front costs, limited knowledge about options, small land holdings, and lack of physical resources, the report finds.
“The real risk now is temperatures. Rainfall has been a problem since pre-history — the great famine of 1899. There is nothing new about precipitation variability. The number of precipitation days is less, but I think the real problem farmers are facing is temperature variation,” Harish Damodaran, National Rural Affairs and Agriculture Editor for The Indian Express, said during the panel discussion.
Using the example of wheat, he said that the quality of its yield has deteriorated because “in central India, winter did not come until the last week of December, and this was the same case with potatoes and onions”.
“I am confident that for a one-hectare farmers, crop agriculture is not sustainable, it’s very difficult. An interesting finding of (the) report is the adaptation to climate change came through depending on animal husbandry and livestock produce,” he said.
(Edited by Zinnia Ray Chaudhuri)