Small and fragmented land holdings have increased due to population pressure and the breakdown of the joint family system. This has negatively impacted fodder production and availability. Most livestock keepers are small or marginal farmers with poor economic status. The demand for food grains has increased pressure on land for fodder production. Fodder availability has decreased drastically due to loss of forests, community lands, and wastelands. Crop residues that are the main source of stall feeding are insufficient. Green fodder production is also low due to degradation of grazing lands from uncontrolled grazing. Many technologies for fodder production and processing are not feasible for small farmers due to high costs.

1. Socio economic aspects in
Fodder Production
Dr. Sadhna Pandey
Scientist (Home Science Extension)
I.G.F.R.I, Jhansi-284003 (UP)

2. • Due to increase in population pressure and breaking of
joint family system, the agricultural land is badly
affected.
• The small and fragmented land holding has increased
the number of small and marginal farmers.
• Majority of livestock keepers are also small and
marginal farmers.
• Due to small and fragmented land holdings, forages
find less scope against food grains and commercial
crops.
Small and fragmented land holdings:

3. • Increasing population pressure has also increased the
demand for more food grains this has again created
pressure on fodder producing areas.
• Increasing demand for food grains, also badly affected
our forests, silvi pastures, community grazing lands,
waste lands etc. due to these factors. T
• he fodder availability has drastically decreased and
also the exploitation of natural resources has
increased.
Increasing demand for food grains &
other commercial crops

4. • Due to poor economic status, they are reluctant in
adoption of forage production technologies.
• Uneconomic price of their livestock products do not
make animal husbandry a very attractive enterprise.
• In the areas of cooperative milk unions, the situation
has improved but the majority of the farmers of the
country are confronting the lopsided growth of forages
and forage based livestock production. (Faruqui,
S.A.2008)
Poor Economic Status of the Farmers

5. • Now days there are more numbers of educated
unemployed youth in villages also as compared to
uneducated unemployed in urban areas.
• As a result of them want to do jobs in factories, offices
etc. Educated youth, have no liking to adopt farming as
a profession and it’s not a good sign for future.
• Due to less involvement of educated youth in farming it
creates a lot of problems in transfer and dissemination
of usable technologies at farmers field.
Changing attitudes:

6. • The crop residues (which are most important source
fodder for stall feeding) are not enough to support the
requirements of the animals making stall-feeding
difficult.
• Low amount and poor quality of feed made the animals
very less productive.
Shortage of crop
residues:

7. • Causes of the generally poor quality of crop residues
and feeds include their high contents of silica, lignin,
oxalates and phenolic compounds, which inhibit intake,
and their slow rate of digestion by microorganisms
resulting in an increased amount of digesta retained in
the rumen.
• Means of reducing these problems are physical
treatments (chaffing, soaking, steam treatment,
grinding, irradiation and urea treatment ) chemical
treatment and supplementation.
Poor quality of crop residues

8. • The dry feed of animals is usually of poor quality,
hence there is need to focus attention on green fodder
cultivation. Generally the bulk of green fodder is
produced in Kharif followed by Rabi and very little in
Zayad.
• Hence, there is an urgent need of putting more area
under green fodder in this period and popularize
methods of preserving extra fodder and other lean
period fodder related technologies among farmers.
• The long-term strategies to overcome shortage of
green/dry fodder needs to be planned on regional basis
through perennial systems.
Scarcity of green fodder

9. • Today, there are evidences of grazing land degradation
through out the country.
• Excessive grazing has done maximum harm to grazing
lands converting them in to highly degraded lands.
• The proportion of low productive animals is very higher
and these kinds of animals which predominantly graze
on degraded wastelands and the arable lands which are
left fallow during most of the year due to lack of
irrigation facilities.
• The green fodder production is also low due to the high
extent of degradation of grazing lands. Less cropping
intensity, proximity to forests, small landholdings and
poor access to market for milk and fodder are the major
causes of free range grazing.
Uncontrolled grazing:

10. • The poor quality feed along with higher thermal stress
conditions and host of other problems decreases
productivity. The main problems causing poor
performance are low amount of digestible nutrients,
inadequate fodder supply, and coarseness of fodder,
fiber and lignifications.
• In most of the cases soils are deficient in macro and
microelements, which in turns makes the forages
deficient in these elements. Among these trace
elements are particularly neglected. Hardly there is any
mineral mixture supplementation in diet. It reduces milk
yield, makes reproductive cycle irregular thus reducing
lifetime productivity and overall health is deteriorated.
Low productive animals

11. • The low productive animals graze in forest areas.
• Which are unprotected, when the forests are protected
and have the joint forest management (JFM) projects.
• Farmers are allowed to cut and carry the green fodder
during the monsoon for stall-feeding.
Poor implementation of JFM projects:

12. • Adequate water is must to boost agricultural
production and grassland production and decide the
availability of drinking water. Due to drought conditions
crops and livestock suffer maximum, which ultimately
bring their production level to lowest.
• During drought period the approach should include
Exploitation of natural resources such as riverbanks,
uncultivated lands and roadside land by planting fast
growing fodder trees, rational use of crop residues, use
of fodder enrichment technologies, use of urea
molasses mineral block and growing legume fodder
crops viz. Sesbania, Subabool and Desmanthus on
wasteland and uncultivable land.
Drought conditions

13. • The farmers are knowing and adopting the technologies
such as haymaking. Soaking, grinding, boiling and
chaffing and make the Saani of the ingredients.
Regarding the other technologies such as CRB
Machine, Bailing / densification, Chemical treatment,
Ensilage, Concentrate processing, Balanced rationing,
Microbial treatment, Use of feed supplement,
Compound feed etc. major problems were cost, easy
availability of the technologies and poor quality of the
compound feed available in the market.
• The farmers were of opinion that it is better to use
home grown ingredients of concentrate in comparison
to compound feed. Large and medium categories of
farmers feed more concentrates to their animals as
compared to small categories dut high cost on
Less feasibility of fodder processing and
compound feed practices for farmers:

14. • Despite many technological options available for
promotion of forage crops in the country, the emphasis
seems insufficient at various levels. I
• n most of the States also the responsibility of planning,
development and promotion of forage crops lies with
Department of AH and Dairying.
• The transfer of technology and popularization of forage
aspects at the States is mostly the responsibility of
veterinary/AH graduates.The focus of livestock
development through government machinery thus is
concentrated mainly on breed improvement, AI, health
care and feeds.
Problems at various
levels

15. • The planning and development of forage seed and
production technology many a times are not matching
the requirements of the region.
• The SAUs have a greater role to play at regional level
and provides greater support their level both in forage
R&D and production of forage seeds.
• All these factors in cumulative terms lead to poor
development of forage programmes in the country.
Area wise planning is necessary

16. Problem in transfer of technology
Transfer of technology in case of forages is the weakest link in the
system.
Forages do not constitute the part of technology package
prepared/implemented by extension agencies.
Lack of adequate kit of forage seeds leads to forage promotion
unattended.
The extension personnel are also not properly trained in forage
related aspects, which makes them incompetent and hesitant in
propagating the forage technologies.
Lack of government support in term of FLDs, mini kits etc. for forage
crops has badly affected in changing the mindset of farmers and
persons engaged in forage production.

17. Marketing network in case of forages is also very
weak. There is no standard marketing structure
and price policy of forages and forage seed.
This has great bearing on development of forages as
such and also dairy as enterprise.
Despite of the fact livestock are life support and
livelihood generating activities in all mixed
farming situations, unorganized marketing and
pricing play demotivating role.
Non-availability of regular fodder
marketing.