Rice production yaya program is one of the major activities coordinated by the extension and training center of the department of agriculture since 1996. The agricultural extension staff of the respective areas is implementing RPYP.

Mission
Achieving excellence in rice industry for agricultural prosperity in Sri Lanka is the mission of the program. 

Objectives of the Program 
Increase the productivity of rice farming
Achieving food security
Making rice cultivation a profitable venture
Improving professionalism in the rice industry
Making quality rice available in the market at affordable price
Attract youths to the rice industry 

Major Activities 
The following major activities are implemented under the rice production yaya program.
 

1	Rice production yaya program
	a) Training of farmers and officers  b) Training of ARDA's c) Conducting crop cut surveys  d) Skill development training program for ARDOO

2	Demonstration program
	a) One acre maximum yield demonstration  b) One yaya maximum yield demonstrations  c) Half an acre maximum yield demonstration by ARDA's  d) Weed control demonstrations.

3	Promotion of soil fertility improvement
	a) Payment for cow dung collection  b) Campaign for organic manure use  c) Yaya soil testing program

4	Promotion of post harvest technology practices
	a) Training of rice millers  b) Training of extension officers  c) Promotion of the use of threshing floor carpets  d) Promotion of use of Agric. machineries (Combined harvester, etc.)  e) Rice product promotion

5	Facilitating other services
	a) Arranging fertilizer credit  b) Facilitating forward contract for paddy marketing  c) Facilitating certified seed paddy production  d) Supply of threshing floor materials

6	Mass media Programs
	a) Print media  b) Radio & television

7	Improvement of rice technologies
	a) Demonstration of package of practices for WL areas (Bw)  b) Development of package for salinity resistance (A-Pelassa)  c) Soil testing, analyzing, interpreting and mapping (Bg)

Personnel responsible for the program 
The director, rice research and development institute and director, extension and raining center are responsible for the overall execution of the program. The following personnel are directly engaged in the implementation of the program.

Program coordinators at national level
 

1.	Mr G A M Shantha Siri Emitiyagoda  Assistant Director of Agriculture  Extension and Training center  Dept of Agriculture  Peradeniya  Tel 08-387405  Fax 08-387403  E-mail shantha@ids.lk

Mr G A M Shantha Siri Emitiyagoda is responsible for coordination of the entire programs.
 

2.	Mr E Abesekara  Extension and Training center  Dept of Agriculture  Peradeniya  Tel 08-388341  Fax 08-387403  E-mail extr@ids.lk

Mr E Abesekara is responsible for rice quality improvement and promotion of post harvest technology improvement practices programs.

Yaya program is implemented in all paddy production areas covering Amapara, Anuradhapura, Hambanthota, Polonnaruwa, Kurunegala Puttatalam Trincomalee Vavunia, Batticoloe, Monaragala, Kandy, Matale, Nuwaraeliya, Ratnapura, Kegalla, Matara, Galle, Kalutara and Gampaha districts. The names and address of the program coordinators of the major rice growing districts are given below.
 

Ampara	Mr P M N Dayaratne  Assistant Director of Agriculture  District Agriculture office  Amapara  Tel/ Fax 063-22066
Anuradhapura	Mr B M Aberatne  Assistant Director of Agriculture  District Agriculture office  Anuradhapura  Tel/ Fax 025-35037
Anuradhapura	Mr B M Aberatne  Assistant Director of Agriculture  District Agriculture office  Anuradhapura  Tel/ Fax 025-35037
Polonnaruwa	Mr N P De Silva  Assistant Director of Agriculture  District Agriculture office  Polonnaruwa  Tel/ Fax 027-22019
Hambanthota	Mr J L P Nimal  Assistant Director of Agriculture  District Agriculture office  Hambanthota  Tel/ Fax 047-20791
Kurunegala	Mr W M Gunathilaka Banda  Deputy provincial Director of Agriculture  District Agriculture office  Kurunegala  Tel/ Fax 037-22325

Description of the program

Justification
Rice sector had been facing unprecedented challenges such as stagnation of yield and productions, diminishing income due to escalation of cost of production, abandoning rice lands, since early 1980s, etc. These issues were mainly due to low productivity. The rice task force appointed by the government in 1994 identified that increasing productivity in rice farming sector as the remedial measure. Meanwhile agriculture department identified rice yaya (tract) demonstration as an appropriate tool to increase the productivity of the small farmer rice-farming sector. 

Rice production yaya program
This is a farmer participatory, group holistic extension approach to increase the productivity of the small farmers, coupled with credit and input supply. The salient feature of this approach is that the cultivation of contiguous paddy land of about 20 ha block by 20-30 farmers in a favorable growing environment. Then they are formed into a group and motivated to use of integrated crop management practices giving more emphasis for soil fertility improvement with optional credit facilities.
This approach is based on few major assumptions, which have contributed to the success of the yaya production program.

1. Available technologies can increase the rice yields
2. Productivity improvement will result in lowering of cost per unit of produce
3. Productivity improvement of small farmer paddy cultivation is technically and socially feasible with the group approach.

The Integrated crop management practices include the followings package of practices.
1. Improvement of soil fertility
2. Proper land preparation,
3. Timely and collective cultivation,
4. Use of good quality seed paddy and
5. Weed control and use of integrated pest management practices. 

The results of the initial work were encouraging and thus yaya program which was considered extension tool was promoted to a production tool and extended to entire country to cover 25% rice extent.
The number of rice production yaya programmes carried out in the last few seasons, number of farmers involved and the extent cultivated are indicated in Table 1.

Number of yaya programs, farmers and extent cultivated 
 

Season	98 Yala	98/99 Maha	99 Yala	99/00 Maha	00 Yala	01 Maha
No. of yaya programs	397	871	823	1153	1153	1479
Extent (Ac.)	8483	36847	40481	57341	56316	62269
No. of Farmers	7655	17741	19456	27325	26509	32630

During the year 1998, this program was implemented, in five major rice grown districts under the special financial assistance from the treasury. Since1999, financial assistance is being provided from the national agricultural production program (NAPP).
The rice production yaya programs have repeatedly shown sustainable increase of 30 bushels per acre average yield in all environments. In the favorable rice grown environment the average increase was about 40 bushels. The average grain yield increase over the last 5 seasons is given in table 2. The department of census and statistics estimated the yields. 

Grain yield increase in the rice production yaya program 
 

Season	Highest yaya yield (bu/ac)	Average yaya yield (bu/ac)	Average yield (out side yaya program) (bu/ac)
Yala 1998	182	113	84
Maha 1999	186	111	82
Yala 1999	170	111	80
Maha 2000	166	108	84
Yala 2000	147	103	80
Maha 2001	151	108	85

Source: Extension and training centre of the DOA (Based on the data provided by the department of census and statistics)

The value of the increased production based on the increased yield and the extent covered under the yaya program is given in the table 3. It indicates that value of the increased production over last 5 seasons adds to 1200 million rupees. 

Rice production from yaya programmes and percent share for national production 
 

Season	No. of yaya	Extent (Ac.)	Yaya average yield (bu/ac)	Out side average yield (bu/ac)	Increased production (m.bu)	Value of increased production (Rs. m.)
Yala 98	397	8483	113.8	84	0.253	50.6
Maha 98/99	871	14739	111	82	0.427	85.4
Yala 99	823	40481	111	80	1.255	251
Maha 99/00	1153	57341	108	84	1.376	275.2
Yala 2000	1141	50556	103	80	1.163	232
Maha 00/01	1479	62269	108	85	1.432	286.4

Trend in average rice yield over last 10 years is given in figure 1. This clearly indicates that rice yield which had been stagnating in the past is now shown an increasing trend. This trend is very much distinct during yala seasons than maha seasons 

Average yield (bu/ac) in Sri Lanka from 1990-2001

Figure 1. Average yield in Sri Lanka from 1990-2001(Source: Dept. of census and statistics) 

Activities planned for the (maha 2001/2002 and yala 2002) year 2002 is given below. 
 

No.	Sub activity	Description	Output
1	Yaya programme	Implementation of 8000 yayas in 22 districts in two seasons covering 120,000 ha of paddy lands and involving 100,000 farmers.	Rs. m. 1,250 worth of increased production
2	Max yield demonstration (One Acre)	Conducting 1,400 one-acre maximum yield demonstrations (integrated crop management practices) aiming 10 mt/ha yield in farmers fields belonging to the rice yaya programme. It is planned to supply DOA recommended chemical fertilizers, Rs. 1,000.00 for cow dung to the participating farmers	200,000 farmers trained on technology
3	Maximum yield yaya demonstration	Conducting 25 of maximum yield demonstrations yayas (integrated crop management practices) aiming 10 mt/ha yield in farmers groups. It is expected to supply DOA recommended chemical fertilizer, Rs. 1000 for cow-dung to the participating farmers and they are expected to continue on revolving fund basis.	20000 farmers trained on concept
4	Rice based integrated farming	400 integrated farms will be established. Selected farmers will be supplied with 3 bags of cement to construct pavements or pits to collect and prepare the compost out of farmyard manure	Add value to cow-dung, 400 farms established
5	Threshing floor synthetic materials	Supply of synthetic threshing floor materials to use with threshers. This will be supplied to agriculture instructor. Farmers can use these on demonstration basis. Each unit will cost about Rs. 5,000.00 and 185 units to be purchased	200,000 farmers trained
6	Training of farmers/officers on new technology & program operation	80 officer training programmes and 24,000 farmer training progrmmes will be conducted. This training will be training classes, field days, field tours, seminars, conferences, etc	3000 officer day trainings & 100,000 farmer day trainings
7	Communication propaganda, TV & Radio programmes	Printing 20,000 copies of 2 pamphlets and 10,000 posters,  2,500 sign boards,  12 Television programmes and TV times  10 Radio programmes and radio times.	40,000 pamphlets 10,000 posters 150 TV spots 300 Radio spots
8	Conducting crop cut surveys	2,000 crop cut surveys and 500 supervisions conducted to estimate the yaya yield levels	10,000 crop cuts 1,250 supervisions
9	Maximum yield demonstration (Half an acre) in high potential areas)	Conducting 400 half an acre maximum yield demonstrations (integrated crop management practices) by agriculture research and development assistants aiming 10 mt/ha yield in farmer fields belonging to the rice yaya programme coming under the new approach to the yaya programmes. It is expected to supply DOA recommended chemical fertilizers, Rs. 500 for cow dung to the participating farmers	400 ARDAA and 40,000 farmers trained on package of practices
10	Promotion of post harvest technology practices among entrepreneurs, extension officers and farmers	Conducting 4 training programs for entrepreneurs at PHTI, Anuradhapura, 4 training programs for extension officers and 22 farmer seminars in major rice producing areas.	150 Mills owners, 88 ARDOO and 2200 farmers trained on post harvest technology.
11	Training of newly recruited extension officers on rice production technologies.	Conducting 6 seasonal long rice production skill development training programs for newly recruited extension officers (ARDOO)	Thorough rice production training given for 200 officers
12	Awareness training on yaya production for ARDAAs	Conducting 50 one day training on yaya production training for agriculture research and development assistants (Govisevana Niyamakas) in major rice producing districts	1,500 ARDAS are given awareness on yaya