Green-Ag, a project funded by Global Environment Facility (GEF), which aims to catalyze a sustainable transformation of Indian agriculture sector without compromising the country’s food security and farmers’ income, has been launched in Mizoram.
Mizoram has been endowed with various elements of natural bio-diversities and it is required that the natural resources there are utilized in sustainable manner. This is aimed at maintaining the optimum equilibrium between ecosystem and economic development. It is one of the five states where the said project is being implemented apart from Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, Rajasthan and Uttarakhand. The project will be implemented in Dampa Tiger Reserve in west Mizoram’s Mamit district and Thorangtlang Wildlife Sanctuary in Lunglei district in the southern part of the state covering more than 30 villages.
Addressing the state inception workshop inaugural programme in Aizawl, state agriculture minister C Lalrinsanga said that the project will serve its purpose in catalysing the sustainable transformation of the agricultural sector whereby providing economic upliftment to the people of the focus area with awareness on conservation of IUCN endangered species and critically vulnerable flora and fauna.
Other key players involved in its implementation are Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), Union Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEF&CC). The project seeks to integrate biodiversity, climate change and sustainable land management objectives and practices into Indian agriculture. The project will end on March 31, 2026, in all states.
The goals of the project aims at achieving multiple global environmental benefits in at least 1.8 million hectares (ha) of land in five landscapes, with mixed land-use systems. The project will try to bring at least 104,070 ha of farms under sustainable land and water management. Also, it will ensure 49 million Carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2eq) is reduced through sustainable land use and agricultural practices.
