Explanation:

As part of its water conservation efforts, the government of Haryana has announced an incentive of Rs 4,000 per acre for farmers opting for direct seeding of rice method.

The move is aimed at giving big boost to conserve water in the state by launching an effective technique for paddy growers.

Direct Seeding of Rice (DSR) is another incentive-driven push which has been introduced as a pilot project by the state government recently to promote water conservation. A cash incentive of Rs 4,000 per acre is offered to the farmers under the scheme.

In Haryana, farmers of 12 paddy growing districts, under the watch of agriculture and farmers' welfare department's experts, will grow paddy through this technique during the current paddy cultivation season.

The state government is promoting this alternative way of cultivating rice to ensure that the water conservation movement gets a boost and farmers also get benefit through this.

Each farmer opting for this scheme can grow the crop using DSR technique and there is no limitation of acreage (area) for them to register for incentive. The traditional paddy transplantation practice is labour- and water-intensive, while DSR doesn't require labour and water of the size and scale of the traditional method and can reduce water consumption and production cost by 15-20 per cent.

Under the DSR technique, paddy seeds are drilled into the field with the help of a machine that does seeding of rice and spray of herbicide simultaneously.

According to the traditional method, young paddy plants are raised by farmers in nurseries and then these plants are uprooted and transplanted in a muddled field.