Pusa (Bihar): Stressing the need for a second Green Revolution in the country, President A P J Abdul Kalam today (Feb 14, 2004) suggested a fresh impetus to multi-cropping, rotation of crops and organic farming for accelerated agricultural growth.

India should now embark upon the second Green Revolution, as it needs to produce over 300 million tons of food grains by the year 2020 surmounting many impeding factors including lesser area available for cultivation with less water.

So, more thrust needs to be given on adopting methods like multi-cropping, rotation of crops and organic farming, Kalam said while addressing the fourth convocation of the Rajendra Agricultural University in Pusa.

He said the Punjab-Haryana region, considered India's "bread basket", could lose its production potential in a few decades if the current patterns of ground water extraction and pollution, soil salinisation and monoculture of rice and wheat persists and called for rejuvenation of soil characteristics.

"Our agricultural scientists and technologists have to work for doubling the productivity of the available land with lesser area being available for cultivation with less water," he said and underscored the need for enlarging the domain of the farmer's work from grain production to food processing and marketing.

He suggested the researchers of the university to produce salinity tolerant and temperature tolerant seeds, which should also be resistant to stress induced by the residual effect of pesticides and insecticides.