By Sunil Kataria

SANGRUR, India (Reuters) -To combat the worsening air in India’s capital New Delhi, several farmers in the neighbouring northern state of Punjab are packing off crop stubble to factories for recycling instead of torching it.

Stubble burning every winter is a major contributor to New Delhi being one of the world’s most polluted cities, with the smoke combining with vehicle exhaust and dust and remaining trapped in the atmosphere because of slow wind speeds in lower temperatures.

However, farmers in over 800 villages across Punjab are now adapting to the use of balers to stack the stubble, and send it to factories where it is turned into biogas, bio-fertiliser, and cardboard, among other commodities, according to the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) group.

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