Mewat
DROUGHT CONTINGENCY PLAN
2012
NAIP Component-3 (SRLS): Climate Change
Adaptation Project (WB-GEF)
Centre for Environment Science and Climate
Resilient Agriculture (CESCRA)
Indian Agricultural Research Institute
New Delhi-110012
16 August 2012
DRAFT
DROUGHT CONTINGENCY PLAN 2012 MEWAT, HARYANA
Mewat, a district in Haryana in North West India, has been
stressed by periodic drought in recent years. Climate change is
expected to increase the drought events.
A Drought Contingency Plan is needed to minimize the adverse
impacts of drought conditions through 2012 and beyond.
To implement such a plan, coordination among the Climate
Change Adaptation (CCA) team, village level leaders, state
department functionaries and farmers needs to be improved. A
close watch on rainfall situation and water resources,
development of early warning capabilities, water shortage impact
assessments and response and recovery programs in the affected
blocks are the prerequisites for implementing this plan. The plan
will also need to be reviewed and updated regularly to provide
current information, technology and strategies to address the
issues of drought.
The community-based drought contingency plan should be
prepared during April-May and September-October each year to
develop strategies for kharif and rabi season, respectively.
The current drought contingency plan 2012 includes a general
framework of planning and coordination for drought affected
blocks in Mewat to facilitate drought response and management;
identifies agricultural activities and strategies that may be
implemented to minimize drought impacts during current season
and next rabi season and develops modalities to enhance
effective coordination of all stakeholders in the drought affected
area.
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Location and Rainfall
Mewat is situated at 28° 06/ N and 77° 00/ E; and at altitude of
200m above mean sea level.
The cumulative rainfall deficit during June to 1st August 2012 was
>80%. During June/July, actual rainfall was 30 mm against the
mean normal rainfall of 212.8 mm. The Nuh block in Mewat
received 140 mm while Tauru block received 193 mm during June
to 15th August 2012.
With the current year drought condition, area under fallow
increased from traditional 20-25 per cent to 35 – 40 per cent for in
situ moisture conservation during kharif to be used for early
sowing of mustard/ wheat crops in Nuh and Tauru blocks.
However, in the project villages the area under fallow is relatively
less i.e.10 per cent owing to introduction of fodder crops, short
duration vegetables, and moong crop.
In response to the recent drought in Mewat region, NAIP Climate
Change Adaptation (CCA) project of IARI advised the project
partners/beneficiaries/stakeholders in August 2012 to take
immediate actions to manage the crisis. Based on the overall
rainfall information and water resources availability, the CCA, IARI
team developed a Drought Contingency Plan to address the
possibility of continuing dry conditions.
Interventions by the CCA, IARI team
1. Green gram (Moong): Technological intervention support was
provided to 128 farming families (50 acres) under CCA project.
This year drought impacted the green gram crop severely. The
affected number of farmers were 25 out of 38 farmers covering
11acres (out of 18 acres) in Bima /Palla/Palladi/Sonkh cluster,
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while only 1 farmer out of 113 farmers in Tauru block was
affected due to severe soil moisture stress. The farmers of
Tauru used life saving irrigation in moong to minimize the
adverse impact of drought.
2. Fodder Sorghum (cvs. Sudex & Rosilla): 155 farming families (46
acres) were supported for fodder cultivation in the project
villages. There were no reports of severe crop damage but few
reports were available for slow growth of fodder crop.
3. Pigeonpea (cvs. P2001/P2002/P991/P 992): CCA project
supported 60 farmers (36 acres) with pigeonpea farming
technology in the project villages. In general, pigeonpea crop
takes longer time to mature while sown during onset of
monsoon i.e. June end. Tauru block is traditionally a pigeonpea
growing area but due to non-availability of suitable short
duration pigeonpea crop varieties, some changes in cropping
system have been reported. In Bima cluster, the crops, which
were sown during May (with application of irrigation water),
were partially affected due to high temperature and high soil
moisture deficit. In Bima cluster, about 40 per cent area of
pigeonpea was affected (i.e.3 out of 7 acres). However, overall
in Tauru block, pigeonpea crop was not affected.
4. Pearl Millet (cv. P-383): The project supported100 farmers (68
acres).In Bima areas 10-15% of farmers faced complete
(100%) crop loss due to drought; where as 25 per cent of the
farmers reported partial damage. In Tauru block, the crop was
not much affected; though poor growth was reported by some
farmers.
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Action taken during July 2012
In Bima, farmers were encouraged to go for vegetable cultivation
and were provided with good quality vegetable seed of suitable
varieties to capture early market demand:
a.
Brinjal (Pusa Uttam) – 5 acres
Date of Sowing -10 July
Date of Transplanting-15-20 August
b.
Bottle guard (Pusa Naveen) – 1.5 acres
Date of Sowing-1st week of July
c.
Onion (Pusa Red) – 2 farmers
Date of Sowing-1st week of July
d.
Cauliflower* (Pusa Meghna) – 5 acres
Date of Sowing-10 July
(*Cauliflower seedlings were affected by high temperature
during July as reported by few farmers)
Contingency plan
1. For traditional fallow areas and areas that could not be sown
due to drought:
Conserve in situ soil moisture in the field and conserve rain
water during August and early September. This is to be done
by forming big clods through coarse ploughing followed by
planking.
2. The situation where crop growths are very poor and beyond
recovery, either plough down the crop or feed to the cattle and
prepare the field to conserve rainwater. Also get the land
ready for sowing of early mustard crop.
3. For standing crop of sorghum/ Pearl Millet / Pigeonpea in
rainfed areas:
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a. Farmers are advised to thin out the plant population upto
15-20% in standing crop.
b. Remove the weeds from the standing crop (hand
weeding)
c. Dust mulching by pulverizing the top soil.
d. If possible, provide life-saving irrigation to crop at critical
stages
e. Apply anti-transpirant such as kaolin spray (6% w/w) on
crop.
4. For drought affected farmers having limited irrigation facilities:
Besides above mentioned options, prepare the fields for short
season vegetable crops/varieties; such as Tomato, Cowpea (Lobia),
Brinjal, Cabbage/Cauliflower during August to November followed
by wheat crop (Late sown wheat varieties; for example
WR544, HD 2985).
5. Farmers are advised to take up early sown Mustard (cvs. Pusa
Mustard- 25 and Pusa Mustard- 26, Pusa Agrani) – sowing by
first week of September to harvest by first fortnight of
December followed by sowing of wheat crop in second
fortnight of December.
6. Alternatively, prepare the land for mustard- normal sowing
(cvs. Pusa Tarak, Pusa Mahak, Pusa Bold) during first
fortnight of October.
7. Farmers are advised to use efficient irrigation techniques such
as sprinkler / rain gun for irrigation in wheat and mustard.
Apply irrigation at the most critical stages as advised by
agriculture experts and state department officials.
8. Farmers having buffalos/cows are advised to provide green
fodder along with mineral mixture @ 50g/animal/day for both
milch and non-milch animals for next 60 days.
9. Special care should be taken for deworming of calves.
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Prepared under the supervision of
Dr. H.S.Gupta, Director
Dr. MalabikaDadlani, Jt. Dir. (Res)
Prepared by
Drs. S.K. Bandyopadhyay, S. Naresh Kumar, R.N.Padaria, M.
Khanna, V.Pooniya, H.Pathak
Assisted by
Drs. S. Chander, R.N.Sahoo, Bidisha Chakrabarti, D.K. Das,
S. Prasad, Mr. H. Ramesh, Md. Rashid, Mr. R. John
Acknowledgements
Drought Contingency Plan could not have been accomplished
without the input and assistance from the following colleagues
and agencies: Head, CESCRA; Head, Agriculture Physics;
Head, Agronomy; Dy Dir. Agriculture (Mewat); Dr. R.N.Sharma;
Ms. Charu Tomar, T.O. (Mewat).
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