Serving farmers and saving farming

The newly-created National Commission for Farmers provides a clear technical roadmap for rescuing Indian agriculture from its present quandary

R V Bhavani Chennai

The greater percentage of India’s population is rural and dependent on agriculture and allied activities. India today, also has the largest number of under-nourished children, women and men in the world. All facts and figures indicate that Indian agriculture is in a state of crisis today. Overall agricultural gross domestic product (GDP) growth in the country has been below population growth for nearly a decade. The mid-term appraisal of the Tenth Five Year Plan has observed a sharp deceleration in agricultural growth from the Ninth Plan onward. The growth rate has been only 1 per cent during the first three years of the Tenth Plan. Investment in agriculture is only about 1.3 per cent of GDP. Indebtedness is on the rise and there are increasing reports of farmers’ suicides from different parts of the country.

It is important to realise that farmers constitute the largest consumer group in the country and no growth can be sustainable unless the problems of this sector are addressed. Farming is also the largest private sector enterprise in the country. The National Commission on Farmers (NCF) under the Ministry of Agriculture, Government of India has the mandate of examining issues facing farmers across the country and making recommendations to the government.  The Commission has defined “Farmers” for the purposes of its deliberations and recommendations, to include landless agricultural labourers, sharecroppers, tenants, small, marginal and sub-marginal cultivators, farmers with larger holdings, fish, dairy, sheep, poultry and other farmers involved in animal husbandry, pastoralists, plantation workers, as well as those rural and tribal families engaged in a wide variety of farming-related occupations such as sericulture and vermiculture.  In all cases, both men and women receive equal attention. The aim is to encompass all categories of people involved directly in agriculture. The canvas is vast and there are myriad issues, both supply side and demand side, to be addressed.      

The NCF has so far submitted four reports  under the broad title “Serving Farmers and Saving Farming” (www.kisanayog.gov.in). The Third Report called for declaring the agricultural year 2006-07 as the Year of Agricultural Renewal and made several recommendations under the five broad heads of land, water, credit and insurance, technology and markets, the pillars of support where measures are needed for agricultural revival and progress. The NCF has also called for renaming the Ministry of Agriculture as Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare and setting up of State Level Farmers’ Commissions for ensuring dynamic government response to farmers’ problems. Farm men and women should be represented in these Commissions.

The major recommendations of the NCF reports under the above five heads together with mention of other significant recommendations, to address the crisis in Indian agriculture, are presented here. 

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