A dialectical perspective of agricultural research for sustainable development

In spite of increased food production in the country due to green revolution, current levels of production cannot be sustained to meet the growing needs of the country. This is because of concurrent degradation of environment in terms of salinity, water-logging, soil erosion and air as well as water pollution, etc. How do we maximize productivity to meet the food needs of the country without deteriorating the environment? This is a challenging task and it requires altogether a different approach in the very basic methodology of agricultural research. We discuss this approach-an approach based on dialectical principles. A dialectical perspective as against the hitherto practised reductionist approach, is presented in relation to sustainability in agricultural production with several illustrative examples.