Assessing Farm Income and Input Efficiency Under Zero-budget Natural Farming in India

As against using chemical fertilisers and associated inputs, Indian farmers have been adopting various agroecological practices under Zero-budget Natural Farming (ZBNF) programme, which are locally sourced at zero/low costs, thus making cultivation economical and sustainable. This article aims to analyse its impact on production costs, farm income and input efficiency vis-à-vis farmers following chemical farming. Based on the political agroecology framework, household survey data and statistical and stochastic frontier production function, it explores the support of the government and local level stakeholders in promoting ZBNF, various agroecological practices followed by the farmers, and how these are related to production costs, farm income and input farm efficiency. It found comparatively low costs, higher farm income and better input efficiency than farmers practicing chemical farming which are statistically significant. Region-specific heterogeneities concerning such differences are very well observed. It suggests optimising the programme’s benefits by addressing constraints faced by the ZBNF farmers and scaling up the programme to other parts of the region. JEL Codes: O13, Q12, R11, R52