India's farming systems face twin stress: declining soil health from decades of chemical-intensive cultivation and rising input costs squeezing farmer incomes. Regenerative agriculture — integrating practices like cover cropping, composting, reduced tillage, agroforestry, and natural farming — is positioned as a systemic solution. Unlike conventional conservation farming, it actively rebuilds soil organic matter, restores microbial life, and sequesters carbon. Government schemes including PM-PRANAM, Paramparagat Krishi Vikas Yojana, and Natural Farming Mission now anchor India's policy push in this direction.

Regenerative agriculture is an approach that goes beyond merely sustaining yields — it seeks to actively restore degraded agroecosystems. The core distinction from conventional farming is directional: conventional farming aims to maintain output with minimum soil loss, while regenerative farming aims to increase soil health, biodiversity, and water-holding capacity over time, ideally making farms climate-resilient without purchased inputs.

Key practices include:
• Minimum or zero tillage — reduces soil carbon loss and preserves microbial communities
• Cover cropping and green manuring — adds organic matter and fixes nitrogen naturally
• Crop rotation and intercropping — breaks pest cycles, improves nutrient cycling
• Composting and vermicomposting — substitutes synthetic fertilisers
• Agroforestry — integrates trees with crops, providing shade, nitrogen, and additional income
• Natural farming (ZBNF) — pioneered by Subhash Palekar, eliminates external inputs, uses jeevamrit and beejamrit

India's policy architecture connects to this: Paramparagat Krishi Vikas Yojana (PKVY) promotes cluster-based organic farming; PM-PRANAM incentivises states to reduce chemical fertiliser use by redirecting subsidy savings; the National Mission on Natural Farming (NMNF), launched in 2023, targets 1 crore farmers.

Soil organic carbon (SOC) is the key measurable outcome — Indian soils average below 0.5% SOC, against a desirable 1.5–2%. Increasing SOC by 0.4% annually (the '4 per 1000' initiative) could offset a significant fraction of global CO₂ emissions — linking regenerative agriculture directly to climate commitments under the Paris Agreement.