Farmers Problems-Rebooting Indian Agriculture

While the Union Agriculture Ministry has been tom-tomming about the achievements of the country for record food grains production of 273 million tonnes during 2016-17 the farmers in Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and some other states have come out with a massive revolt against the system and had been putting the law and order system into fire. The mayhem in Mandsuar had resulted in the death of 6 farmers in police firing. This is a wake up warning for the political leaders and policy makers of this country. The depth of seething anger against the government apathy to the cause of farmers had led the mischief mongers to indulge in loot and arson and provoking the simple distressed farmers to take law into their own hands.  The system in India are so designed and ossified that unless riots take place the system ignores the  problems. The country as a whole and MP governments in particular must brood over and analyse what has gone wrong despite the Chief Minister who himself is a Kisan and under whose leadership MP has progressed in food grain production at an annual rate of 9.7 % during 2005-06 to 2014-15 when national average growth was 3.6%. Not only food grains the growth of fruit and vegetable production in the country has also been commendable during the last few years.

However, policy makers must recognise that  increase in production of food items and the welfare of farmers are two different matters. The farmers are still unhappy and seething in anger and have become easy prey at the hands of trouble makers including the selfish politicians because the increased production has not been profitable and led them to debt trap.

Therefore, the problems of farming are deep rooted and systemic in nature and over the years policies of agriculture and allied sectors lack incisive vision and are cut off from ground reality and thus fall flat due to peculiar nature of our farming culture, inheritance laws and environment both physical and socio-political that controls the bio-productive systems. The government authorities know the problems but the solutions are just marginal improvements in existing systems and that too with poor execution and corruption. As for productivity from the same net sown area of 141 million ha compared to India's highest of 273 million tonne in 2016 China produced 500 million tonnes in 2011.

The biggest problem is fragmentation of land holdings as more than 80% of the farmers are small and marginal with 70% farmers owning on an average 0.15 ha of land in 2011 and as per NITI Ayog report 53 % of farmers are living below poverty line. The large farmers of more than 10 ha are very less and may not be more than 1 to 2 %. On account of splitting of land holdings in every next generation the farming due to multiple factors, climatic vagaries and unreliable monsoon is becoming unviable. The 4.69 crore farmers have taken 12.60 lakh crore loan in the country. The scarcity of capital at hand for most of the farmers results in bad loans and the consequent debt trap is leading to 12500 suicides by the farmers annually.

The mechanization of farming is essential for cost cutting but not possible due to fragmentation and poor capital. The next problem is the deterioration in soil quality due to overuse of  land as well as fertilizers and pesticides. The best fertilizer the cow dung is mostly used by the farmers for fuel. There is absence of timely supply at affordable prices of the  quality seeds and other inputs. The agriculture in India is heavily dependent on monsoon rains and less than 60 million ha are having irrigation facilities and rest 85 million ha is rain fed. The poor storage and post harvesting technology backup is poor and the problem is compounded by poor transport facilities.  According to an estimate 67 million tonnes of the food grains are wasted in India due to lack of infrastructure. The corruption at the lower level of bureaucracy and lackadaisical attitude of superior bureaucracy have compounded the problem farmers face.  Last but not least is the problem of marketing the produce at prices that will make farming a profitable venture. The archaic policies and lack of innovations is  resulting in farmers falling in debt trap even if they produce more.

The recent upheavals in MP and other states  was led by poor sale price of Onion due to  bumper production. The farmers were getting only Rs 2 for a kg of Onion which is far below the production cost. A few months ago in Madhya Pradesh again the bumper production of tomatoes led the farmers to destroy the crop. This distress among the farmers of MP has come at a time when the agriculture sector had registered a growth of 9.7 % between 2005-6 and 2014-15 compared with the national average of 3.6%. The area under fruits and vegetables has increased by 78% since 2010-11 in the state. The farmers in MP are suffering a net loss of 15% in the paddy and a mere 2% profit from wheat. The boom in agriculture in MP had adversely affected the farmers income and the consumers and  middlemen though are beneficiaries at the cost of farmers.

India has plenty  of sunshine and plenty of rainfall so our farmers should not suffer the agony of feeding the million at their cost. Before the situation gets out of hand it must be treated as an important political agenda at the national level itself by overhauling the system gradually. The government must have a two prong strategy. The one for the 50% of the small farmers who own 3% of the agricultural land and the other for 10% of the farmers who own 50%  of the agriculture land. First thing need to do done is to introduce farmers cultivation planning and budgeting at the village level by the agriculture, horticulture, animal husbandry and other departments in which each farmer will be given a cultivation card which will have planning for the growing of desired crops based on his soil type, market and preference. The card will also have budget details for the inputs and will replace the soil cards issued to the farmer. The departments will prepare a consolidated plan for the village and make arrangements like consolidation of farming/ cooperative farming/sharing of machines etc. The scheme for the mechanization should be revisited and site specific proposals developed so that small and marginal farmers may not get a debt trap on buying these equipments. The farmers must release the cow dung for fields and free/subsidised gas connection may be given to all farmers in villages. The village level plans must be consolidated at the block and district level and a true picture must emerge for each season on the type of crop to be produced and its marketing linkages. One of the key elements of village plan should be the crop diversification, conservation of agricultural bio-diversity and staggered planting of vegetable seeds so that the final products mature for harvesting in staggered fashion so that the glut like situation of fall in prices could be avoided. If the agriculture, animal husbandry, fisheries and horticulture etc departments guide the farmers, farming will become profitable. The other key element of the village plan should be integration of cattle farming and breed improvement of indigenous cows with the core agriculture planning for better returns. The government should evolve an institutional mechanism for this which should be run in partnership with local farmers. MP government had in the past successfully handled the problems of Tendu patta collectors. After ensuring planned production of crops the next reform and strategy should be to provide inputs and marketing facilities. The government agencies must involve private sector in creating sufficient storage and transport facilities so that the crops are safely stored and provide backup marketing linkages. The norms of fund sanction should be state specific and flexible to cater to local needs. There should be proper assessment and supply of high yielding varieties with special focus of preservation fast vanishing agri-biodiversity particularly of paddy and wheat. The government should also review its export and import policy and tune it in favour of farmers. The Prime Minister's promise of doubling the income of farmers can be ensured provided these suggestions are accepted and the existing focus on production is shifted to making farming a profitable business for the farmer. (1431 words). The article was also published in Pioneer on 14th July 2017