14:00 – 15:30 (CEST)

AGD Meeting Room (B640) - The Seminar will be conducted in English

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How to scale-up agroecology to 580,000 farmers in 3 years ? The experience of the Climate Resilient Zero Budget Natural Farming in Andhra Pradesh (India) will be shared in this event. This people-centered programme on regenerative agriculture has been implemented by Government of Andhra Pradesh since 2016, quickly reaching large numbers through an innovative farmer-centered and government-supported model. The objective is to scale to 6 million farmers by 2024. The Programme promotes the use of locally-produced, ecological inputs and a redesign of farming systems with intensive polycropping, agro-forestry and crop-livestock integration and 365-day a year green cover, using farmer to farmer dissemination, participatory videos and intensive action research engaging farmers, agriculture graduates, international scientists and national institutions.

Since 2018 FAO has supported the implementation of Farmer Field Schools in the ZBNF Programme, focusing on soil health and integrated farming based on agro-ecological principles. FFS are now being scale throughout the state of Andhra Pradesh. CR-ZBNF is one of the largest initiatives on Agroecology globally to date.

Speakers:

Shri Vijay Kumar, Co-Vice Chairman, Rythu Sadhikara Samstha and Adviser to Department of Agriculture, Government of Andhra Pradesh, India. Vijay Kumar has several decades of experience promoting sustainable agriculture in India as a high level civil servant, and on scaling-up Self Help Group to 10 million women in India. Since 2016 he has spearheaded the Climate Resilient Zero Budget Natural Farming in Andhra Pradesh. The Programme received an award at the Paris Peace Forum in 2018 and was nominated among the 30 best policies on Agroecology by the World Future Council, FAO and IFOAM in 2018.

Anne-Sophie Poisot, Projects Coordinator, Farmer Field Schools, FAO. Anne-Sophie has been working on Farmer Field Schools on sustainable agriculture and Integrated Pest Management since 2003, coordinating projects in many countries. From 2017 to August 2019 she was based in India as the Sustainable Agriculture Adviser at FAO-India.

Agenda:

The Seminar is organized by the Technical Network on Sustainable Crop Production and Agroecology and the Plant Production and Protection Division