Soil Health Card Scheme- 2022

What is Soil Health Card (SHC)?

The ministry of agriculture introduced the soil health card (SHC) scheme on 5th December 2015, SHC is a printed report which contains the nutrient status of soil concerning 12 nutrients: pH, Electrical Conductivity (EC), Organic Carbon (OC), Nitrogen (N), Phosphorus (P), Potassium (K), Sulphur (S), Zinc (Zn), Boron (B), Iron (Fe), Manganese (Mn), Copper (Cu) of farm holdings. SHC will be provided to all farmers in the country at an interval of 3 years to enable the farmers to apply recommended doses of nutrients based on soil test values to realize improved and sustainable soil health and fertility, low costs, and higher profits. A soil health card is a field-specific detailed report of soil fertility status and other important soil parameters that affect crop productivity.

Objectives Behind SHC

• To improve soil quality and profitability of farmers.
• Employment generation for rural youth.
• To update information on soil analysis.
• To provide soil testing facilities to farmers at their doorstep.

Specifications of Soil Health Card

The cropped area was divided into grids of 10 ha for rainfed and 2.5 ha for irrigated and taken only one soil sample from each grid and test results will be distributed to all the farmers whose area was falling under the grid. Soil samples are processed through standard procedures and analyzed for various parameters namely pH, electrical conductivity (EC), Organic Carbon (OC), available N, P, K, S, and micronutrients (Zn, Cu, Fe, Mn & B), The State Government will collect samples through the staff of their Department of Agriculture or the staff of an outsourced agency. The State Government may also involve the students of local Agriculture/Science Colleges, Soil Samples are collected generally two times a year, after harvesting Rabi and Kharif crops respectively, or when there is no standing crop in the field.

Benefits Of SHC

• SHC helps farmers to improve soil health and ultimately increase productivity.
• After getting SHC farmers reduced N, P, and K use, especially nitrogen use, and increased micronutrient use, which helped increase fertility.
• It has helped farmers to diversify towards less input-intensive crops from more input-intensive crops like paddy and cotton.
• It has also helped farmers to find input substitutions.
• It has helped in the formulation of specific schemes like subsidized micronutrients from governments.