Topic: Agrarian Crisis: Are we concerned enough???

Chhaganlal Verma, one of the classmates of my father, at the time of M.Sc., completed his P.G. with respectable aggregate. Inspite of the fact, that he was offered a lucrative job in a reputed company, he was forced to join his family profession, i.e. farming. After more than two decades of this decision, he feels sorry now, for not providing a resistance.

This is not the case of Mr. Verma, or any other farmer doing a rethinking. But, it corresponds to the paradigm shift in the way to look towards one of the most prosperous and regenerating areas of our country's development, i.e. Agriculture. As former Prime Minister of India, Mr. Lal Bahadur Shastri, rightly pointed out the importance of a Farmer and a Soldier, in his famous quote, "Jai Jawaan, Jai Kisaan" indicating that these two sections are the pillars of India. And now, with suiciding farmers, degrading soil fertility, rising grain prices, a vital need of import creeping in, and a bad distribution system in place, we are facing one of the worst crisis historically. Agrarian Crisis and Food Security have emerged as the biggest failures in the UPA govt's report card.

The Changing Scenario:-
In 1960-70s, India was predominantly driven by agriculture and related sectors. When we were faced up to some bourgeoning population problems with reducing food grain production, we countered in beautifully with a Green Revolution. Similarly, the problems related to milk, milk products and dairy co-operatives was resolved by the White Revolution. India is a rapidly industrializing and modernizing society. But still, with 60-70% population involved in agriculture and almost everyone dependent on it, India can never overlook the so-called backbone area of its economy. M.S. Swaminathan, chairman of M.S. Swaminathan Research Foundation and father of India's green revolution warns, "An agriculture emergency is developing not only in India, but globally. Agriculture is gradually emerging out as the riskiest profession in the world." Considering the fact that per capita availability of food grains has dropped 15% to 440 grams a day in the past 15 years, this statement of Mr. Swaminathan looks quite appropriate. There was a time a few decades ago, when India and China used to be equivalent in terms of agri-produce. But today, while India produces about 2617 kg of wheat per hectares, China with its superb agri policies and proper reforms grows more than 4450 kg per hectare. Few years back, the country used to have a food grain surplus and was one of the major exporters to other countries. Today, it has to import food grain for fulfilling the domestic demand. While central farm subsidies have jumped from Rs. 2450 cr. in 1990-91 to Rs. 31,545 cr, it has still not helped in creating lasting assets for irrigation or soil upgradation. Pronab Sen, India's chief statistician correctly asks, "It may be true that there is enough production to meet domestic demand, but do we have enough supply to meet this extended demand?"

Less accessibility: -
One of the major problems pertaining to the present agrarian crisis is 'Debt'. According to the govt., 1,36,324 farmers have committed suicides in India from 1997 to 2005 due to indebtedness. Co-operative institutions & banks charge 9% annual interest on farm loans. On the other hand, despite of charging 36% interest per annum, moneylenders thrive and account for roughly 75% of the loans disbursed. As per the National Sample Survey, 59th Round, 2004-05, 51.4% of farmer households in the country did not access credit either from institutional or non-institutional sources. We talk of Banking reforms and a liberalizing economy, but what is the use of all this, if the people who need it urgently can't access it, whenever they want, to suit their needs. As one of the educated farmer from Punjab says,"It is easier to tap money lenders for a quick loan. If I try to access the facilities of bank, going through a bank agent, I will get only Rs 85000-90000 if a Rs 1 Lakh loan is sanctioned." Reserve Bank, under the instructions from UPA govt., formed a committee to examine these issues, which suggested the setting up of Accredited Loan Providers (ALP). It means legitimizing those moneylenders who take loan from banks and offer them to poor farmers at high interest rates. Instead of implementing this proposal, govt. should strengthen co-operative institutions and rural banks to make them readily accessible to farmers.

PDS and MSP factor: -
PDS i.e. Public Distribution System is the complete channel through which the agri-produce reaches the end consumer, in accordance to the government. The PDS itself has been attacked for the leakage, cost of delivery and diversion of supplies to open market. To counteract on these problems, alternatives like food stamps have been suggested. But, with the monitoring of PDS arising as a problem, their is no reliability of food stamps and other options working accordingly. "Instead, a dual price system should be followed," says Mr. Chand,"Keeping one price level that encourages farmers to produce the volume needed to meet the country's requirement and another that makes food affordable for economically-weaker sections."
MSP or Minimum Support Price, on the other hand, is the amount fixed by the government to procure food grain supply and distribution. The concept of MSP is farmer-oriented and the idea of PDS is consumer-oriented. It may be the most important cause that PDS prices have not been raised since April 2000, whereas the MSP and open market prices for wheat and rice have increased by over 50%.
Now, considering the PDS and MSP factor, a transparent monitoring and feedback mechanism must be implemented in order to avail both the farmers and the consumers, the proper benefit, of the actual produce.

Soil Degradation:-
Farming is not a young child in India's economic school. It is, indeed, the principal of the school. Ever since our fore fathers and their fore fathers started farming, we have been using same soil to grow our crops. Not even once, we paid attention towards letting the soil relax. This thought may seem absurd, but our soil, infact cultivable soil, is generating the best-possible output in least-favorable conditions. It lacks some vital nutrients responsible for increasing the yield of our farmers. According to Prof. Swaminathan,"There are 14 different nutrients required by the soil, but our policies have favored only Nitrogen. We need soil testing laboratories, which would issue a soil health card to every farmer". Besides concentrating on Soil aspects, we would also look towards other crucial points worth working, including post-harvest technology, threshing etc.

Government Policies:-
According to United Nations, across the world, an area of fertile soil equal to the size of Ukraine is lost every year because of drought, deforestation and climate instability. Nobel Prize winner Amartya Sen has said in his book,” Famines occur not necessarily due to food shortages, but also due to social and economic factors such as declining wages, unemployment, rising food prices and a poor food-production system". If we look from India's perspective, all of these things can be controlled if proper govt. policies are put in place. The programmes like NREGS will prove effective only if their is appropriate monitoring of the channel through which the jobs are being provided to rural people. The schemes like Annapurna and Antyodaya will bear fruits consistently only if continuous supply is maintained. The agri-sector is still largely dependent on rains and so; Monsoon becomes the most important decider of the output generated. In this condition, Irrigation is the sole option remaining to be used in order to increase crop production. The ground water table has gone down, farmers now need to use more electricity to draw the water. The fact that only 40% of our total cultivable area is covered by irrigation generates serious threats. Govt. needs to sort out the problem of irrigating the fields and illuminating the urban houses. It needs to take some imperative steps in the direction of bringing the reforms into the Agriculture sector.

Proposed Solutions: -
Unlike fast growing IT or Financial sector, Agriculture doesn't have quick-fix solutions. It’s not the case of borrowing $200 billion from any other bank and getting rid of all the problems. Changes ought to be made, but they would take place gradually. Agri-sector demands endless patience, micro-level planning & an integrated approach to combat the problems of soil degradation, water management etc.
The first and most important solution suggested is "Contract Farming". One of the good examples of Contract Farming is Pepsi Co. deal with Punjab Agro that yielded better results. A farming done on the same land, in the same time, by the same farmer yields different results when performed with corporate sponsorship. In this case, farmer needs to do two things: grow the crop demanded by the company and provide the crop in the specified time limit with the amount fixed beforehand. The implementation of Contract Farming is quite tedious, but can be done with a little amount of co-operation and understanding between the two parties.
Secondly, "Organic Farming" is the keyword to long-term success in agri-market. Organic agriculture practice involves preservation of natural bio-diversity and effective management of biological and natural resources to improve farm productivity. The organic foods market is growing rapidly in U.S., Europe and Japan accounting for $26 billion and it is the focus of only a small group of farmers in India. However, exporting organic food is just like eating iron-cookies. There is a need to meet 61 standards & complete the cumbersome third-party certification process. But, organic cultivation, which accounts for 26 million hectares worldwide, has a huge potential that can be unleashed by India, which accounts for only 2.5 million hectares.
Thirdly, there should be a channel from farmer's gate to user's plate, which has been absent & prevented the farmer from accessing new-age technologies, infrastructure and practices. Integrated Agro Food Parks (IAFP) would be trying to generate the channel with the help of Rural Transformation Centers (RTC). The Research institute will provide seeds to RTCs. The RTCs will forward seeds, credit, finance and other necessary things to farmers. It will also enable farmers to get better market linkages, exposure, learning and earning. However, the most important point is that this project will have to survive without any Govt. funding.

India, right from the ancient times, has been famous for its bio-diversity and multiple kinds of farming. Agriculture has been the feather of the Taj of the Mother India. It is quite difficult to assess the agrarian crisis precisely. We should remember that we have small and marginal farmers living in pathetic conditions. They don't have enough to feed their families, not enough clothes on their bodies and no means to educate their children. Their tired, despairing eyes know more about the murky situation of agrarian crisis than statistics can ever show. Government should take the crucial measures urgently to provide them with the minimum requirements of Roti and Kapada in order to strengthen them for the Future.