Trouble looms for Indian grain that combats climate change
On a tiny sliver land in southern India, the future of an ancient grain that helps combat climate change is in doubt
KOCHI, India (AP) — On a tiny sliver land in southern India, the future of an ancient grain that helps combat climate change is in doubt.
An ongoing tussle in Chellanam village, a suburb of the bustling city of Kochi, which has the Arabian Sea on one side and estuaries on the other, could decide the fate of the cultivation of pokkali rice.
In many wetlands in the area, farmers have traditionally dedicated half the year to pokkali rice and the other six months to prawns. In 2022, the Fisheries Department of Kerala issued an order that farmers no longer needed to dedicate part of the year to pokkali, exacerbating a trend away from pokkali already under way. While prawns fetch more money than pokkali, a focus on them is upending a delicate ecosystem, making it difficult for farmers who want to continue with pokkali, environmental experts say.
M.M. Chandu, a 78-year-old farmer with about 0.8 hectares (a little over 2 acres), said that increasing salinity in the land from year-round prawn cultivation was degrading soil and making it more difficult for him to grow pokkali.
