Government of India revises crop residue management guidelines for northern states

New Delhi: The Centre on Saturday said it has has revised the crop residue management guidelines for Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, and Delhi, to help tackle the challenge of stubble burning in these states and improve air quality. As per the revised guidelines, techno-commercial pilot projects for paddy straw supply chain will be established under the bilateral agreement between the beneficiary/aggregator, such as farmers, rural entrepreneurs, cooperative societies of farmers, Farmer Producer Organisations (FPOs), and panchayats, and industries utilising the paddy straw, the agriculture ministry said in a statement. The initiative will supplement the efforts of paddy straw management through in-situ options. During the three-year tenure of the interventions, 1.5 million tonne (mt) of surplus paddy straw are expected to be collected, which would otherwise have been burnt in fields. About 333 biomass collection depots of capacity 4,500 tonne will be built in Punjab, Haryana, Uttar ...