Shaping Science as the Prime Mover of Sustainable Agriculture for Food and Nutrition Security in an Era of Environmental Degradation and Climate Change

At the time of India's independence in 1947, India's food production for national food security was highly insufficient. Malthusian scourge in the backdrop of Bengal famine of 1943 was looming. It was at a time of critical food shortage in the 1960s, commodity-centric exploitative agriculture, miscalled as Green Revolution, was ushered in by Swaminathan-Borlaug partnership. It changed India's image then as begging bowl to bread basket! As had been foreseen and forewarned, the Green Revolution resulted in environmental degradation, enhanced social inequities and had little to do with sustainable agriculture and rural development. With the lessons learnt, Swaminathan developed a systems approach-based evergreen revolution to achieve productivity in perpetuity without accompanying environmental and social harm. It is also designed to fight both the famines of food and rural livelihoods with the help of ecotechnologies having pro-nature, pro-poor, pro-women and pro-livelihood orientation. The present article elaborates these aspects.