This book discusses the important issue of the socioeconomic and environmental impacts of
agricultural residue burning common in agricultural practices in many parts of the world. In
particular it focuses on the pollution caused by rice residue burning using primary survey
data from Punjab India. It discusses emerging solutions to agricultural waste burning that are
cost-effective in terms of both money and time. The burning of agricultural residue causes
severe pollution in land water and air and contributes to increased ozone levels and climate
change in the long term. However appropriate assessments have not been undertaken so far to
demonstrate the relevant impact of agriculture-based pollution especially residue burning.
This book addresses this gap in the literature. Punjab has been used as a case study as it is
the chief granary of India contributing to 27.2 percent of the Indian national produce of rice
and 43.8 percent of wheat. It is presumed that the findings from this state will be useful not
only for other agricultural areas in India but across the world. This book therefore
sensitizes policy makers researchers and students about the impacts of air pollution caused by
agricultural residue burning---a subject not much dealt in the literature---and provides a way
forward.
