{"id":34544,"date":"2022-11-05T05:04:14","date_gmt":"2022-11-04T23:34:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/?p=34544"},"modified":"2025-04-20T14:49:05","modified_gmt":"2025-04-20T09:19:05","slug":"the-harvest-of-polluted-air","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/the-harvest-of-polluted-air\/","title":{"rendered":"The Harvest of Polluted Air"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3><strong>What\u2019s in today\u2019s article:<\/strong><\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Stubble Burning \u2013 reasons, areas where this practice is rampant, steps taken etc.<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>News Summary<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h3><strong>Why in news?<\/strong><\/h3>\n<ul>\n<li>The haze and smoke over Delhi has become an annual event for about three weeks in October-November.<\/li>\n<li>The current situation has triggered a temporary ban on\u00a0construction activities and the movement of trucks and diesel four-wheelers that do not comply with BS-VI norms.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Stubble Burning<\/strong><\/h2>\n<h2><strong>Why Farmers opt for Stubble Burning?<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>Rice and wheat straws left in the field, after combine harvesting, are generally burnt by the farmers to\u00a0facilitate seed bed preparation and seeding.<\/li>\n<li>Farmers find this method as quick and cheap compared to other practices for crop residue management.<\/li>\n<li>Since input costs of farming is going up day by day, farmers are not willing to further invest in equipments useful for crop residue management.<\/li>\n<li>Happy Seeder (a tractor-operated machine for in-situ management of paddy stubble) continues to be an expensive method for majority of farmers<strong>.<\/strong><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Areas where this practice is rampant<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>Burning of agricultural residue is done on a large-scale basis in states such as\u00a0Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and National Capital Region of Delhi.<\/li>\n<li>This is prevalent in other states too. This includes: Bihar, Odisha, West Bengal etc.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Steps Taken by the government to tackle this issue<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Taken by Centre<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>A Central Sector Scheme on \u2018Promotion of Agricultural Mechanisation for In-Situ Management of Crop Residue in the States of Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and NCT of Delhi\u2019 was approved.<\/li>\n<li>Farmers are being provided 50 percent of the cost of machinery\/equipment as financial assistance for the purchase of such machinery.<\/li>\n<li>Over the last three years, the Centre has been heavily subsidizing various agriculture machines.<\/li>\n<li>Profit from the left-over biomass is shared with farmers.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Taken by State Governments and Other agencies<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>States governments and other agencies are sensitising farmers on healthier practices.<\/li>\n<li>Recently Punjab government decided to give incentives to industries which install paddy-straw-fired boilers.<\/li>\n<li>It also decided to provide non-fiscal incentives to these industries in terms of availability of Panchayat land for storage of paddy straw with lease agreement upto 33 years.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Pusa Decomposer<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>It\u00a0is\u00a0a bio-enzyme developed by the Indian Agricultural Research Institute (IARI)\u00a0to decompose crop residue.<\/li>\n<li>It decomposes stubble within 20-25 days after spraying and turn it into manure, improving the soil quality.<\/li>\n<li>It is cost effective as well. One packet of four capsule costs Rs 20 and can be used to make 25 litres of solution that can be used in one hectare.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Way Forward:<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>Creation of markets for crop residue-based briquettes (a compressed block of combustible biomass material)<\/li>\n<li>Nearby thermal power plants must mandatorily undertake co-firing of crop residues with coal<\/li>\n<li>A special credit line should be established for financing farm equipment and working capital for private sector participation<\/li>\n<li>Alternate beneficial use of crop residues must be promoted.\n<ul>\n<li>These include: compost production, bioenergy production, biochar production, in pulp and paper industry etc.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li>There is a huge potential to convert crop residues and food\/ plant wastes into bio-fuel. Government should start incentivising industries engaged in production of bio-fuels.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>News Summary<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li>The haze and smoke over Delhi has triggered a temporary ban on construction activities and the movement of trucks and diesel four-wheelers that do not comply with BS-VI norms.<\/li>\n<li>The Supreme Court will hear a petition on agricultural stubble burning in the northern states.<\/li>\n<li>The stubble burning is considered the prime reason for the extremely bad air quality in Delhi-NCR.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<h2><strong>Factors responsible for the pollution<\/strong><\/h2>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Burning of agricultural waste<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>At this time of the year, the burning of agricultural waste in Punjab and Haryana is indeed the dominant reason for the smoke and haze over Delhi.<\/li>\n<li>The particulate matter from the burning contributes 30-40% of the PM2.5 concentrations in Delhi\u2019s air during this time.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Weather<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>The weather also plays a critical role as well \u2014 a 30-40% rise in pollutants at any other time of the year would not cause the same impact.<\/li>\n<li>During October-November, the pollutants are trapped and tend to get concentrated at lower levels of the atmosphere, resulting in the smoke and haze situation that is being witnessed now.\n<ul>\n<li>During summer time, hotter air rises higher above the surface, and takes the pollutants along with it.<\/li>\n<li>Hence, the polluting particles are lifted 2-3 km above the surface or even higher, before getting dispersed.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Other factors<\/strong>\n<ul>\n<li>Construction activities; Movement of diesel vehicles, particularly older trucks etc.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Air pollution is outdoor environment by any chemical that modifies natural characteristics of atmosphere.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":34545,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-34544","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-upsc-mains-current-affairs","8":"no-featured-image-padding"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34544","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=34544"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/34544\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34545"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=34544"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=34544"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vajiramandravi.com\/current-affairs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=34544"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}