The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI) is developing renewable energy based cooling technology in partnership with Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) of Australia and an industrial organisation in India.
Informing this, TERI Director General R K Pachauri, said in his convocation address at University of Agricultural Sciences here: "We believe that access to cold chains would make a significant impact in allowing farmers to preserve their produce, which otherwise would need to be sold at suboptimal prices or just allowed to perish whenever there is a seasonal glut in the market".
Pachauri, also Chairman of Inter-Governmental Panel on Climate Change, New Delhi, also called for institution of early-warning systems by which farmers can learn about some possible extreme events before they actually occur.
He also said unless agriculture is seen through the prism of all round rural development, the country would not be able to reduce the growing risk that farmers will face on account of climate change and climate variability, and a range of other stresses.
"...An assessment of the impacts of climate change and what it implies in respect of water availability, floods and droughts as well as temperature increases would be vital for planning agricultural operations", Pachauri said.
