Why a flood-hit Punjab is bad news for food security

The floods this year are so severe that most are already comparing them to the disaster of 1988.

Land of five rivers – Punjab- is under water. With all 23 districts inundated due to heavy rainfall (highest in past 25 years) and flooding, reports are already pointing to 3 lakh acres of cropland lost or damaged due to the floods. So does this portend another hit to our food security?

Punjab recorded the maximum area under paddy cultivation this kharif season about 32.46 lakh hectares — including 6.80 lakh hectares of Basmati. The southern Malwa belt of Punjab - Bathinda, Fazilka, Mansa, Muktsar, Moga, Barnala, Sangrur, and Faridkot, also saw a major shift from cotton to paddy this season. But as luck would have it, the heavy rains and floods, as per some reports destroyed 20-25% of the basmati production in Punjab. The fragrant pearl variety is also the biggest victim as it was due for harvest in less than a month.

To put facts in perspective, Punjab supplies about 40% basmati for exports. The state also accounts for 12% of India’s rice production and also is major contributor to the public distribution system (PDS). A bad harvest very well, would push prices up and supplies low, especially for PDS system.

Extent of damage can be assessed only after water recedes

As most paddy growing areas have been hit the real damage can only be accessed after the water recedes. Hopefully the paddy stalks will still be standing, but if not we risk losing between 20-30% of the total paddy crop this kharif.

What adds to the troubles is the erosion of top soil due to the receding/flooding waters. Often times when the water recedes back it takes with it layers of top soil and leaches the fertilizers.

On the other hand, flooding rivers and streams can also deposit huge sediments on fields, destroying crops and making then uncultivable for the season. Punjab is already battling massive soil degradation due to excessive use of agri-chemicals, salination and water logging, the floods will add to the farmers' troubles.

Now if we talk of the crops that are damaged or survive the floods and heavy rains, they will present newer challenges. The excessive moisture in the soils will start new cycles of pest breeding and the damaged crops are more prone to pest attacks. This will necessitate that the farmers use excessive pesticides and herbicides to tackle these challenges. The cost of production will naturally go up just with pesticide usage, and also it opens opportunities for pesticides black marketers and fake pesticides being circulated in the markets, as seen before in Punjab.

The floods this year are so severe that most are already comparing them to the disaster of 1988, where over 500 people lost their lives and Punjab suffered huge losses of livelihood and property.

Furthermore, the farmers with crops still standing would also need more chemical fertilisers for their crops to nurse them back to good health. The only problem is that India is experiencing urea and agri-chemical shortages. Farmers all over the country, including in Punjab were protesting for inadequate supply of agri-chemicals, meanwhile the India’s urea and agri-chemical supply is also dwindling due to geopolitical and prices reasons. So if the agri-chemical don’t reach on time, we can expect further losses to the paddy crop in Punjab. If we look at the worst case scenario, we could see a major losses in cereal production from Punjab due to all these factors.

Neglect of basic maintenance

Why did this happen? Wasn’t Punjab prepared especially after the great floods of 1988? The answer is clearly no, and now India has to pay the price for ignored canals systems, bad water management and disaster planning. Punjab too like other parts of the country suffers from corruption which plays out in forms of encroachment, disrepair of canals, illegal sand and rock mining in rivers. There also has been little effort put in promoting indigenous systems of water conservation. Most of the available land has been taken for industrial agriculture as a result ground water levels in Punjab are shrinking at an alarming rate.

The callous nature of the state government in water and soil management is the major reason for the disaster to amplify. And of course the opening of the dam gate to release the overflowing debris and water flowing in from Himachal is a major reason too, but Punjab government ought to have de-silted the rivers beds and created secondary reservoirs and conduits so the excessive water could either be conserved or diverted safely away from the crops and human settlements.

Ways to mitigate the fallout

Firstly, we need to have a white paper on the damages to crop in the kharif season, so a realtime assessment can made. This will clear the air on supplies, and prevent market speculation.  Second, we need to have water conservation structures built in each village, to harvest rain water and also prevent floods from destroying crops lands. The canal and rivers needs to be de-silted, and overflow channels should be created. All settlement on the flood plains should be removed and Punjab needs an aggressive forestation campaign, especially along the rivers and canals. Early warning systems needs to be deployed at the village level to alert villagers of floods or releasing of water from the dams.

As for the PDS, government needs to have more procurement centres in UP, Bihar, MP etc. to fill the gaps in the paddy procurement. Overall the push should be towards regenerative agriculture and research on floods and drought resistance native seeds should be started. Biochar based soil healing methods should also be introduced to rejuvenate the soils. And finally government needs to have an active flood and drought mitigation plan that can be activated to prevent losses and revive a flood disaster hit region in the minimum time.