Innovation in Small-Farm Agriculture

Dr. Amitava Rakshit, an IIT-Kharagpur alumnus is the faculty member in the Department of Soil Science and Agricultural Chemistry at Institute of Agricultural Sciences, Banaras Hindu University (BHU), Varanasi, UP, India. His research areas include: Nutrient use efficiency, Simulations modeling, organic farming, Integrated Nutrient Management and bioremediation. His consulting capabilities are: Composting Techniques, Soil Health Management, Input quality Control. He was involved in "Participatory Research" and "Lab to Land" Programmes of ICAR; Dept. of Agricultural Cooperation, Govt. of India; Department of Agriculture, Government of West Bengal;NHB, New Delhi and NHM for on farm demonstrations of agro-technologies in cereals/pulses/oilseeds/cash crops/vegetables/fruits. Actively involved in imparting training and dissemination of technical knowledge and information to diversified end users. He has supervised approximately seven research projects, many in partnership with industry. He is widely acknowledged for his skills in linking research with the broader community in regional languages. He has been working closely with undergraduate and post-graduate students in BHU presently. He has visited Norway, Finland, Denmark, France, Austria, Russia, Thailand, Egypt, Turkey, UAE and Bangladesh number of occasions pertaining to his research work and presentation. Dr. Rakshit has previously worked at Department of Agriculture, Government of West Bengal in research extension and implementation roles. He is the fellow of TWAS Nxt (Italy), BiovisionNxt (Freance), Society of Earth Scientists, Crop and Weed Science Society. He is presently the Chief Editor of International Journal of Agriculture Environment and Biotechnology (NAAS: 4.55). He is serving as review college member of British Ecological Society, London since 2011-12. He was awarded with Best Teacher's Award by BHU (ICAR, New Delhi) both at under graduate and post graduate layer in 2012 and 2014. He is a member of Global Forum on Food Security and Nutrition of FAO, Rome and Commission on Ecosystem Management of International Union for Conservation of Nature. He is the author of twenty-two books (Springer, CRC, Elsevier, CBS, ATINER, ICFAI, Kalyani, Jain Publishers, IBDC, Scientific Publishers and DPS). He has published 100 research papers, 40 book chapters, 28 popular articles and 3 manuals.

Dr. Somsubhra Chakraborty, a Louisiana State University (USA) alumnus is presently the faculty member in the Agricultural and Food Engineering Department at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Kharagpur, India. He has worked as a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow at West Virginia University, USA. His research areas include portable proximal soil sensor measurement, digital soil mapping, mobile image-based soil analysis, and app development. Moreover, he has proved the applicability of portable XRF to quantify several soil properties and soil heavy metal contents. Dr. Chakraborty has developed a patented methodology for combining multiple proximal soil sensors to improve the predictive accuracy relative to the individual technique in isolation on the analyte of interest (US patent US-2017-0122889-A1) titled "Portable Apparatus for Soil Chemical Characterization". He has on-going collaborations with scientists from several countries including the USA, Canada, Romania, Brazil, China, and Morocco. He has received the Australia Awards Fellowship (2016) and Shastri Scholar Travel Subsidy Grant (2019-20). With more than 50 peer-reviewed publications in reputed international journals, Dr. Chakraborty has an h-index of 23 and i10 index of 41. He is an editorial advisory board member of Geoderma (Elsevier), the global journal of soil science. He is currently supervising five Ph.D. students and co-supervising two Ph.D. students.

Dr. Manoj Parihar is currently working at ICAR-Vivekananda Parvatiya Krishi AnusandhanSansthan, Almora, India as a Soil Scientist in Crop Production Division. He did his graduation from SKRAU, Bikaner and selected as ICAR-JRF fellow for post-graduation in Banaras Hindu University (BHU), Varanasi. He has been awarded doctorate from the same university in the year 2018. He has received various recognitions such as ICAR-SRF, UGC-BSR, UGC-RGNF etc. His research works extend to arbuscular mycorrhizal fungal diversity, ecological functions and inoculum production aspects for improving soil health and sustainable agricultural production. He has edited two books, and published >10 book chapters and >25 peer-reviewed journal papers.

Dr. Vijay Singh Meena, working as a Project Coordinator at International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT)-Borlaug Institute for South Asia (BISA). He worked as Scientist at ICAR-Vivekananda Parvatiya Krishi Anusandhan Sansthan, Almora, India. His research areas include various aspects of soil aggregation, carbon management index and carbon and nitrogen sequestration potential under different land types and cropping systems of north-western Indian Himalayas. He identified carbon management index as the key indicator to measure soil degradation in different agroecosystems. His research revealed that the application of FYM and vermicompost along with vegetative barrier across the slope are highly effective in sustaining the soil quality. He reported that potassium solubilizing rhizobacteria (KSR) enhances 25-40% potassium (K) availability and help plants to uptake K from the soils. Dr. Meena identified that the combined application of organic and inorganic sources is important in sustaining the productivity of Himalayan soils and prevent soil erosion. Combined use of FYM and inorganic fertilizers on equal N basis (50 + 50 FYM) resulted in higher productivity of maize and wheat crops than an individual source. However, in-situ green manuring and inorganic fertilizers on equal N basis (50 + 50 GM) resulted in reduction of runoff and soil loss, maintained system productivity, leading to the conservation of natural resources in soils of maize-wheat cropping system.He is instrumental in the preparation and distribution of >4000 soil health cards to different hill farmers at the current institute. He recently reported the carbon and nitrogen sequestration potential of different land use and cropping systems in Indian Himalayas. He also edited seven Springer books on microbes and agricultural sustainability. He has received several scholarship and awards during his academic and professional career. In a nutshell, Dr. Meena is working in the field of natural resources management for sustainable agricultural production. He has an h-index 43, i10-index 77 with more than 5200 citations in international literature.

Dr. Pradeep Kumar Mishra is presently working as Vice Chancellor of Jharkhand Technical University. Previously he was Professor (HAG) Chemical Engineering, IIT (BHU) and former head of the Department of Chemical Engineering at IIT (BHU) Varanasi. Prof Mishra has published more than 100 papers in reputed journals and filed 5 patents. He has authored/edited morethan dozen books and contributed scores of chapters in books/encyclopaedias. In addition to his technical contribution Prof Mishra has been pioneer in the field of Innovation, Incubation and Entrepreneurship in Eastern UP and established first Incubator (Malviya Centre for Innovation Incubation and Entrepreneurship) at BHU in 2008, which is the part of IIT (BHU) Varanasi now. He is also coordinating the activities of CISCO ThinQubator in association with CISCO and NASSCOM in the area of Artificial Intelligence, Internet of Things and Machine Learning. Prof Mishra has been decorated with various awards/honours, prominent of them are Dr Shirin Gadhia Memorial Sustainability Award, 2017, 2ndNational Prize for book writing in Hindi by Ministry of Renewable Energy, GOI and DST Lockheed Nomination for Technology Commercialization for 2010 and 2012. He is member board of governors of NISBUD, Min of Skill Development and Children Emancipation Society UK. He has also represented a delegation to Germany on the invitation of German Biogas Association on behalf of Indian Biogas Association. Professor Mishra has also been selected for prestigious Leadership of Academicians Program and successfully completed it at IIT (BHU) and Pen State University, USA in March-April' 2019. He has also been appointed as Co-Coordinator for 2ndLEAP being organized by the institute in collaboration with Cambridge University, UK. Prof. Mishra has delivered over 100 invited talks in the area of Environment, Energy, Entrepreneurship and Motivation in addition to various field of Chemical Engineering at various forums including Institutions of eminence.

Dr. H B Singh is Professor of Excellence, Department of Biotechnology, GLA University, Mathura, India. Prior to this assignment he served as a Professor at Banaras Hindu University (2006-2019) and Head from Oct. 2014-Sept.2017. Spent 37 years of committed service in the field of Plant Pathology at different institutions in different capacities. Guided 24 students for Ph.D., six Post-Doctoral, two Women Scientists and 29 M.Sc.(Ag.) students. Established fruitful research collaborations with academic and industry researchers and published jointly with national and international collaborators in high impact journals and obtained 19 patents (USA, Canada, PCT) and five technologies were commercialized. Published >270 research papers, 35 review articles, 83 book chapters, 27 edited books. Member of DBT Task Force on "Biofertilizers and Biopesticides"; DST WOS-A Task Force; DST WOS-B Task Force; DBT Task Force for Biotechnology Based Programme for SC/ST Population and Rural Development; DST NSTMIS Task Force; Faculty Expert member of Department Council in several Universities; served as a member of selection committees at different Universities to select faculty in Plant Pathology and Biotechnology, and Agricultural Scientists Recruitment Board (ASRB) ICAR, New Delhi; Member of Research Advisory Committee (RAC) of ICAR-NBAIM, Mau and ICAR-NCIPM, New Delhi, QRT member ICAR-DMR, Solan, ICAR-NBAIR, Bangalore. Chairman: Agricultural Sciences, UP Council of Science & Technology, Lucknow (March 2020- March 2023). Prof Singh is Fellow of National Academy of Agricultural Sciences (FNAAS) and has been honoured with several prestigious awards. Google Citation: 7983 h-index: 46, i10-index: 163.