Impact of Improved Agro-techniques on Sustainable Livelihood Empowerment: An Economic Study from West Bengal

The study has assessed the impact of viable technological interventions on food and livelihood security to the farmers of four selected disadvantaged districts, viz. Uttar Dinajpur, Dakshin Dinajpur, Malda and Murshidabad of West Bengal as a part of National Agricultural Innovation Project. The participatory and personal interview methods were followed to collect the information. The performance of the technological interventions was studied by following “Before-After†design. The cumulative effect of the technological packages like varietals replacement (VR), resource conservation technologies (RCTs), new crop sequencing (NCS), integrated farming system (IFS) increased the cropping intensity and augmented productivity for all major cereals (49.63%), oilseeds (43.02%), pulses (58.44%) and potato (23.85%), addressing the food insecurity issue of around 64.26 per cent farm families. The net effect resulted in higher return from the enterprises like crop, livestock, poultry, and aquaculture and value addition to the tune of 25.96 per cent, 86.04 per cent, 67.43 per cent, 45.59 per cent and 179.06 per cent, respectively and generating 27.19 per cent enhanced employment from different enterprises. Undoubtedly, the latest proven and economically viable technologies like RCT, VR, NCS, IFS and backyard poultry and goatery rearing have a good positive impact on food and nutritional security, leading to improvement of livelihood sustainability.