India Insights: Testing Climate-Resilient Agriculture in Eastern India Through the Case of Odisha
Didarul Islam
Odisha, lying alongside the Bay of Bengal, is significantly vulnerable to climate change, often experiencing cyclones, heatwaves and heavy rainfall. About 210 cyclones have hit the state between 1891 and 2018. In comparison, its neighbouring state West Bengal experiences similar issues however, it sees a lower number of cyclone strikes and floods. Due to its vulnerability, Odisha has emerged as the forerunner in millet production and agriculture reform in order to move away from water-intensive rice cultivation, thus promoting climate resilience. However, inequality adapted to emerge in these well-intentioned practices as well, revealing deeper tensions around food security and livelihoods.
Rice, along with wheat, forms the backbone of Indian agriculture and was key in solving the food scarcity crisis of the 1960s. With the Green Revolution and subsidies, the government placed emphasis on rice production in Eastern India; today, however, rice is exacerbating the region’s vulnerabilities. It is a water-intensive crop which heavily contributes to the depletion of groundwater; moreover, rice production’s prioritisation prevents crop diversification.
The Odisha Millets Mission and Irrigation Reforms
Thus, the Odisha Millets Mission (OMM) was born in 2017 to address such issues, one state at a time. Not only does it aim to ensure climate resilience, but also it attempts to bring back millets, a key food item for Odisha’s tribes. OMM recommended the increased production of millets in agriculture, citing their high nutritional value and their tendency to fight diseases such as diabetes and heart-related issues. In order to achieve its mission, the programme provided rationed millets under the Public Distribution System (PDS) and recommended the certification of the crop to secure a minimum support price (MSP) for farmers’ benefit. Moreover, the programme included the exhibition of millet-based recipes in local workshops to promote its consumption, and in villages, farmers attended training to increase millet production.
OMM received so much policy support that 2023 was declared the International Year of Millets. The grain was included in mid-day meal programmes in school, and the programme itself is now being structured for incorporation into other states. OMM helped the farmers of Koraput region in producing a surplus of millet, which ensures their stable income.
In terms of climate resilience, the Indian Institute of Water Management Bhubaneswar carried out capacity-building programmes to demonstrate sustainable irrigation and water management practices among farmers in Odisha. Furthermore, the International Water Management Institute (IWMI) also implemented micro-irrigation systems in the state to prevent wastage of water.
In collaboration with the World Bank, the state also introduced the Odisha Integrated Irrigation Project for Climate Resilient Agriculture (OIIPCRA), which aims at reducing dependence on water-intensive crops and increasing access to water management and irrigation services. This included rehabilitating water tanks and increasing aquaculture practices like fishing.
Policy Gaps and Lessons from Odisha
While these initiatives are aimed at food security and climate resilience, they reveal the stark realities and inequalities on the ground. OMM shows goodwill, but the procurement of millets is still not on the same level as that of wheat and rice. This hinders farmers from taking up millet production instead of rice. Moreover, the quality of the seeds is still not up to par due to high cultivation costs and the quality of millet seeds to support farmers’ shift to millet. On top of that, millet production is a labour-intensive process post-harvest, and the tasks are usually carried out by women. This points out the gendered division of labour wherein women’s work is more strenuous, especially due to the lack of mechanisation of the process. Since women usually work within the walls of their homes, their labour often goes unpaid and unseen.
Many farmers also oppose new irrigation projects like the one on the Samakoi River, which aims to build a dam to provide more water for crops. They argue that it threatens to submerge various villages. This conflict highlights flaws in the top-down approach wherein the lived realities of people are overlooked under state-led decisions. Issues also emerged with the OIIPCRA, with the spending being much lower than the budget and constant project delays.
Taken together, these cases point out the gap between policy and lived realities through the lens of climate resilience in Odisha. When the social issues and inequalities are not addressed, provisions for climate resilience remain agricultural objectives and not social projects that include the complicated realities in their mission. Odisha’s experience also demonstrates that agricultural reform can’t be separated from political economy. India still places emphasis on rice cultivation, which doesn’t give as much priority to diversification, thus leaving limited space for millet. Moreover, agricultural reforms too follow a top-down approach wherein infrastructural expansion is given more importance than community acceptance.
As OMM is gaining national recognition and there are talks of replication in other states, it is important to address the structural limitations of the programme, such as gendered labour, uneven uptake and rice dependency, in order to not reflect the same problems, especially among tribals and marginalised farmers. The mission is already gaining ground in female empowerment spheres and managing the gendered aspect of labour by collaborating with women's self-help groups (WSHGs); these ensure that women are a part of the entire millet market chain, rather than just the post-harvest processes. They are already providing credit and market linkage to women in order to empower them to become financially independent, which in turn improves household incomes by involving all the members as paid labour. This demonstrates the importance of addressing social inequalities for a project meant to help the people. Odisha thus stands as both a model and a cautionary tale for states wanting to adopt climate resilience and agriculture reforms, especially within tribal communities.
