All posts tagged: crop diversification

From 11 acres to 26: this Muktsar farmer turned his land to triple his income | Chandigarh News

From 11 acres to 26: this Muktsar farmer turned his land to triple his income | Chandigarh News

4 min readJalandharUpdated: Jul 26, 2026 10:38 AM IST Balwinder Sandhu dropped out of convent education after matriculation due to a paucity of money given his family circumstances and started traditional wheat and paddy farming on his family land. Later, he began shifting to horticultural crops, starting with just two acres in 2010-11. The 51-year-old farmer at Sukhna Ablu village in Muktsar Sahib district today owns 26 acres, of which he transformed around 20 acres into a diversified organic farm “Preet Agro Nature Way Farm”, producing nearly 35 to 40 varieties of fruits, spices and a similar range of seasonal vegetables. “I started with just two acres of horticulture by shifting from wheat and paddy in 2010-11. I gradually expanded after seeing the response from customers and realising that there was a market for fresh produce,” he says. Sandhu has planted an unusually wide range of fruit varieties, including kinnow, daisy, malta, mitha, Nagpuri orange, Japanese orange, different varieties of lemons and chakotra. (Express Photo) Sandhu inherited about 11 acres from his father, who had …

Over ₹15,300 crore proposed for agriculture, allied sectors: Punjab FM

Over ₹15,300 crore proposed for agriculture, allied sectors: Punjab FM

Chandigarh, Punjab Finance Minister Harpal Singh Cheema on Sunday proposed an outlay of ₹15,377 crore for agriculture and allied sectors in the 2026-27 budget, aimed at supporting targeted interventions in crop diversification, sustainability, market reforms and farmer welfare. Over ₹15,300 crore proposed for agriculture, allied sectors: Punjab FM While presenting the budget estimates, Cheema said to promote sustainable cropping patterns, a pilot project encouraging a shift from paddy to kharif maize has been implemented in six districts Pathankot, Gurdaspur, Bathinda, Sangrur, Jalandhar and Kapurthala with an incentive of ₹17,500 per hectare. An allocation of ₹15 crore has been earmarked for this purpose in 2026-27, he said. To address the challenge of crop residue burning, the government continues to provide an 80 per cent subsidy to panchayats and a 50 per cent subsidy to individual farmers for the purchase of stubble management machinery. During 2025-26, ₹402 crore has been utilised for subsidising such equipment, and a budgetary provision of ₹600 crore is proposed in 2026-27, Cheema said. Meanwhile, Agriculture Minister Gurmeet Singh Khudian highlighted the success …

Why Haryana’s agriculture is different from Punjab’s | Explained News

Like with rice-wheat, many economists and policy analysts conflate Punjab’s agriculture with that of Haryana. Both states are seen to embody the best and worst of the Green Revolution, helping India turn self-sufficient, if not surplus, in rice and wheat production and also paying a steep environmental price through mono-cropping of the two cereals. But just as wheat and rice are grains apart, the field realities are somewhat different for Punjab and Haryana, the latter of which goes to the polls for its state assembly on October 5. The Punjab story Rice-wheat monoculture — farmers growing just the two crops during the kharif (monsoon) and rabi (winter-spring) seasons respectively, year after year — is an apt description for Punjab’s agriculture. Table 1 shows the average share of rice in Punjab’s total crop area sown during the kharif season over the last five years (2019-20 to 2024-25) at 86.8 per cent. The average share of wheat during rabi is as high as 97.9 per cent. In absolute terms, the state’s area under rice cultivation has risen …