Nabarangpur, 1st Sept 2025: The soil of Nabarangpur is becoming toxic for maize cultivation. Environmentalists and the district agriculture department have expressed concern about whether even grass will grow in the soil in a few years. This has become a warning bell for farmers and residents of Nabarangpur.
A significant portion of Odisha’s chemical fertilizers is being used in the soil of Nabarangpur district. While the national average for chemical fertilizer use per hectare is around 160 kg, in Odisha it stands at 140 kg. However, in Nabarangpur district, it is as high as 208.421 kg per hectare, which is about 48 kg more than the national average.
Currently, paddy is cultivated on about 95,170 hectares of land in the district. Though the government reports maize cultivation on around 70,000 hectares, actual farming is happening on over 1.5 lakh acres including forest and encroached government land.
To increase production, farmers are applying urea and other fertilizers up to three times in maize cultivation. Farmers believe that using chemical fertilizers on hybrid seeds will yield 2 to 3 times more produce, so they are blindly applying large amounts to their fields.
Due to this, double the government target area is now under maize cultivation in the district, and to get higher yields, farmers are using three times the amount of chemical fertilizers and large-scale pesticides. As a result, soil fertility is decreasing and acidity is rising. The situation has worsened to the point where even grass might not grow in the future, according to experts.
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