It seems that the district authorities’ and agriculture experts’ campaigns to raise awareness as well as the cooperatives’ and farmers’ subsidies for machinery to deal with straw scientifically haven’t been very successful.
Source: The Hindu Business Line
An audit of the Rs 1,370 crore provided by the Centre to Punjab from 2019 to 2022 as a subsidy for the purchase of crop residue management (CRM) machines would reveal if there were irregularities in the utilisation of this grant, even though the number of farm fires significantly decreased from 71,304 in 2021 to 49,900 in 2022.
Source: NDTV
The crop planted on 32 lakh hectares is anticipated to produce more than 22 million tonnes of straw this season. The state government’s forecast of using 16 million tonnes of straw will be rendered useless if the current practice of burning stubble is not swiftly reversed.
Even as the Commission for Air Quality Management in NCR & Adjoining Areas monitors the use of the 1,17,672 CRM machines the state currently has, with 23,000 more on the way, its goal of eliminating fires in six districts and a general reduction by over 40% as compared to 2022 appears challenging.
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