Prospective Scenario towards Carbon Dynamics of Indian Farming and Forestry Practices

Abstract

India has been bright to harvest enough to feed its 1.25 + billion, as well as export farm and forest-based products to other countries. But the challenge to feed a projected population of 1.6 billion in 2050 and provide them with nutrition security under climate change scenes, is arduous because of the endlessly degrading natural resource base and shrinking of virtuous lands for forests and agricultural crops. It has been projected that to meet the demands of that vast population, there is an inevitable need of multifold enhancements in land productivity, water productivity and labor productivity as well. The current era of Anthropocene has been endorsed by both climatic and non–climatic factors, which will certainly increase the risk of food and water security across the globe. Among all, carbon (C) sequestration is one such important strategies that could mitigate the effect of above complex elements to a fair extent by transferring atmospheric carbon into the long- live natural pools such as soils, forests and perennial green biomass. The closing aspire of this write-up is to offer a fundamental perception on carbon dynamics and its integrated management on agricultural farms and forests along with predominant prospects to devise a cohesive approach for better perception and tackling of carbon-based managerial issues. Some valued food for thought is made part of this manuscript to realize active role as well as importance of land use and water conservation facets with futuristic R&D.