Aligning Agricultural Research and Extension for Sustainable Development Goals in India: A Case of Farmer FIRST Programme

Abstract

Agricultural development and farmers’ welfare occupy a central place in the development goals of India. Various pathways which have evolved over the years have been implemented in the country to propel agricultural growth by shifting its focus from achieving food sufficiency to sustainable income and inclusive growth. The Farmer FIRST Programme (FFP), an innovative frontline extension program of the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), was launched in 2016 to enhance the reach and effectiveness of agricultural research with a multi-stakeholder approach. This paper evaluates the outcomes of the FFP implemented in ICAR institutions for the upscaling of those promising technologies, which have resulted in a significant impact on the farming community. The criteria chosen for assessing the outcomes are farm income, cropping intensity, use of chemical fertilizers, pesticides, and organic manure, and nutritional security. The data were collected from 50 FFP-implementing institutions for the period 2016–2021 and grouped into six different zones. The results revealed that there is a significant increase in income, cropping intensity, nutritional security, and saving pesticides through this program. The nutritional security, measured using cereal equivalent quantity (CEQ), showed a considerable increase in average consumption in all the zones. Overall, FFP interventions have resulted in achieving significantly higher income and the nutritional security of the farmholds compared to the control. The recorded results are favorable for scaling up and institutionalizing the FFP approach at the national level. The study recommends a participatory mode of an interdisciplinary approach for the effective scaling-up of the FFP across the agricultural research and development landscape of India.