This programme promises Energy efficiency through agriculture demand side management by reduction in overall power consumption, improving efficiencies of ground water extraction, reducing subsidy burden on state utilities and also investment in power plants through avoided capacity.
Agriculture plays a vital role in India’s economy over 70% of the rural households depend on agriculture. Agriculture is an important sector of Indian economy as it contributes about 17% to the total GDP and provides employment to over 60% of the population. AgDSM programme consists of methodologies and policies aimed at bringing a change in the power consumption patterns of consumers (farmers). All project implemented under AgDSM in India have focused on replacement of existing inefficient agricultural pump sets with BEE star-rated energy efficient pump sets along with creating awareness for using Energy Efficient pump sets.
To promote the Energy Efficiency in various fields of Agriculture sector the major initiative that have been undertaken are:
India is the second-largest producer of fruits and vegetables in the world. The time taken for the farm produce to reach the market increased and further augmented the food losses across the supply chain. A comprehensive study conducted by the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) estimates that in the case of fruits, overall losses range from 5.8% to 18% while in the case of vegetables this range is between 6.8% to 12.98%. The food loss that occurs post-harvest and before connecting to markets is effectively a loss of saleable volume and value and is an economic burden on the food supply system.
The Government is committed to its goal of Doubling Farmers’ Income (DFI) by 2022-23, and the inter-ministerial Committee on DFI emphasized that modern agri-logistics and a revised market architecture is necessary to achieve this objective. Agri-logistics is central to mitigate food loss by physically connecting farm produce to consumption points, providing farmers the option to expand their selling range and offers them a choice of markets. Agri-logistics ensures that farmers’ efforts result in economically gainful productivity and is the backbone of future agricultural development.
The India Cooling Action Plan (ICAP) launched in March 2019 highlights that the cold chain sector offers an excellent opportunity for reducing cooling demand, energy consumption and refrigerant requirement through improved design and use of energy-efficient building material, cooling equipment and information technology. Bureau of Energy Efficiency has recently conducted a detailed study on assessment of options for enhancing energy efficiency in the cold chain sector with a focus on packhouses. Some of the major recommendations of the study are:
BEE, which is already a key stakeholder in operationalizing the ICAP recommendations, envisages to work synergistically with the M/o Agriculture and Farmer’s Welfare (MoA&FW); M/o Food Processing Industries (MoFPI); and Agricultural & Processed Food Products Export Development Authority (APEDA) for aligning the ongoing efforts on DFI and realize the importance of a robust cold chain infrastructure to provide essential market linkages to reduce food loss and ensure food security. It is also proposed to leverage the ongoing platforms, including the cold chain thematic group, formed by M/o Environment, Forest & Climate Change (MoEF&CC) for the implementation of ICAP, to align the execution of this study’s recommendations.
Number of Farmers/ Pump-technicians/ Stakeholders trained and motivated for using the Energy Efficient Pumpsets:
