TopInsuranceArticles : 2014

A good year for agriculture, a bad year for farmers

Despite a deficient monsoon, 2014 was a year of record agricultural production. But the buoyancy in production failed to translate into a higher income for farmers. It was a year of disappointment for farmers.

During the agricultural year 2013-24, which ended in June 2014, farmers produced a record harvest of 264.4 million tonnes of foodgrains. Not only in foodgrains, quantum jumps were also witnessed in the production of oilseeds, maize , cotton and pulses. Production of oilseeds reached a record high of 34.5 million tonnes, a jump of 4.8 per cent. Maize production increased by 8.52 per cent to reach a level of 24.2 million tones. Pulses production reached an all-time high of 19.6 million tonnes, an increase of 7.10 per cent over the previous year. Cotton production too touched a record high.

In Kharif 2014 too, despite the shortfall in monsoon rains, farmers produced a bumper crop of rice, maize and cotton.

With such record production, and that too at a time when monsoon had acted as a damper, the nation remains indebted to the virile and hardworking farmers. Despite being at the bottom of the pyramid, Indian farmers have not failed the nation. Probably knowing this, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had, ahead of the Lok Sabha elections, promised to provide more income in the hands of farmers by implementing the Swaminathan Committee report. BJP had time and again reiterated its promise of ensuring farmers a 50 per cent profit over the cost of production.

But in reality, farmers were given a paltry increase of Rs 50 per quintal in the minimum support price (MSP) for paddy and wheat, which translates into an increase of 3.6 per cent, not even enough to offset the additional burden from the prevailing inflation rate at that point of time. On top of it, basmati rice and cotton witnessed a crash in its prices. While basmati rice production had doubled in Punjab and Haryana, an alarming dip in prices was observed. Disappointed farmers sold basmati at prices ranging between Rs 1600-2400 per quintal, against a price of Rs 3,261 to Rs 6,085 they got last year.

In cotton too, prices slumped from an average of Rs 4,400 to Rs 5,200 per quintal last year to around Rs 3,000 this year, prompting the government to direct the Cotton Corporation of India to step in to buy at the procurement price of Rs 3,750 per quintal. Let us not forget that the jump in basmati and cotton production happened as farmers had incurred an additional cost on diesel to run tube wells for irrigation. Punjab and Haryana had recorded a 50 per cent shortfall in monsoon.

As if this was not enough, Ministry of Food had issued a directive asking State Governments not to provide any bonus over the MSP. In case, the State Governments continue to provide bonus, the Ministry will withdraw from procurement operations. State Governments have also been advised to reduce procurement in view of the excessive stocks in storage. In other words, farmers are being increasingly left to face the vagaries of the markets.

With the Food Corporation of India (FCI) being made to gradually withdraw from procurement operations, Chhatisgrah, Madhya Pradesh and Punjab are witnessing a deliberate delay in procurement operations. Chhatisgrah, which had promised to buy ever grain of rice produced by farmers, had limited rice procurement to a maximum of 10 quintals per farmers. After protests, it agreed to buy 15 quintals per farmer. In Punjab, an inordinate delay in making spot payments to farmers is being seen as a subtle message to farmers not to produce more rice.

Coming at a time when farming is already faced with declining incomes and rising indebtedness, the failure to prop-up agriculture will only add to the exodus from the farm. With land acquisition made easier, and also extending it to multiple cropped areas, agriculture has become a sacrificial goat in the road to economic growth. All talk of economic reforms has so far remained confined to the industry. Agriculture does not figure at all on the economic radar screen of the country. The implications it will have on the country’s food security in the years to come are being simply glossed over.

The continuing apathy is clearly visible from the significantly low budgetary provisions for agriculture year after year. In 2013, agriculture received 19,307-crore from the annual budget kitty (exceeding Rs 16 lakh-crore), which is less than 1 per cent of the total budget outlay. This year, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley provided only Rs 22,652-crore to agriculture and cooperation departments.

Source: 2014 -- A good year for agriculture, a bad year for farmers. ABPLive.in
http://www.abplive.in/incoming/2014/12/31/article465644.ece/2014-A-good-year-for-agriculture-a-bad-year-for-farmers

2014 -- The year of the continuing tragedy on the farm

This traumatic picture sums up the tragedy of Indian agriculture in 2014

Year 2014 is almost ready to slide into history. Newspapers and TV channels are busy with the year-end coverage of the events that dominated the media space in 2014. Pick up any newspaper or switch any TV channel, you will not even find a mention of the great continuing tragedy of the farm. It looks as if the other India does not even exist.

Agriculture engages, directly or indirectly, more than 70 per cent of the 1.25 billion population. We all know that agriculture continues to play a pivot role in rural economy howsoever bad it may be. But as I have been saying for long the fact is that agriculture has disappeared from the economic radar screen of the country. It has also disappeared from the media space. Popular economic discourse is aimed at destroying whatever remains of Indian agriculture.

In reality, agriculture is the only performing sector in India's economy. Despite the neglect, agriculture is the brightest spot, with the growth rate bouncing to the magical figure of 4 per cent. Farmers continue to sweat it out to produce a bountiful harvest. Even with a delayed monsoon, farmers have achieved what was not expected. And yet they remain victims of a biased economic understanding, which refuses to value food self-sufficiency as the most important pillar of national sovereignty. Many economists want import tariffs to be further reduced to allow cheaper and highly subsidised imports. They scream shamelessly, and a section of the media plays it up using the argument of rising food inflation as the justification.

Studies after studies, and report after reports, have brought out the deepening crisis on the Indian farm. A study by the Centre for Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) "State of Indian Farmers" in May 2014 had said it very well. The study found that 76 per cent want to give up farming, and such was the crisis that roughly 58 per cent farmers were sleeping hungry. And yet, the government enhanced the minimum support price of paddy and wheat (and other crops) by a paltry Rs 50 per quintal. This does not even meet the rise in prices as a result of all round inflation.

Will anything change in 2015? I don't want to sound pessimistic but I am not so hopeful. Unless the Prime Minister Narendra Modi diverts focus to rejuvenate the farming sector, makes an attempt to end the scourge of farmer suicides, and thereby makes efforts to turn agriculture economically viable and sustainable in the long-run, I don't see any future. He has the mandate, and certainly he has the ability.

This can only happen if the public discourse shifts to resurrect agriculture. So therefore don't blame the government or the media alone. You too are equally responsible. If you were to raise your voice, in whatever form you think you can do it, maybe through tweeter, facebook and what's up, you will see that what you say will resonate. In a democracy, the public opinion is very important. It's therefore your task too create a debate on the issues that are generally ignored. Continue to do that and you will see the focus returning back to restoring the pride in farming. #

Agriculture is not only in a terrible crisis, but is fast decaying.

So it’s all working according to the plan. The latest round of National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) report on the “Situation Assessment Survey of Agricultural Households” for 2012-13 clearly shows what was largely expected. Agriculture is not only in a terrible crisis, but is fast decaying.

I am not surprised. After all, the demise of Indian agriculture is on the lines suggested by the World Bank way back in 1996. The World Bank had estimated that in the next 20 years, by 2015, the number of people migrating from rural to urban areas in India will be equal to the combined population of Britain, France and Germany. The combined population of these countries is 20-crore, and the World Bank had anticipated that 40-crore people would be moving out of the rural areas in India by the year 2015.

This is only possible by creating conditions that make farming uneconomical forcing farmers to quit agriculture and migrate to the cities looking for menial jobs. In its 2008 World Development Report, the World Bank had wanted India to hasten the process of taking people out of agriculture by going in for land acquisitions and launching a network of training institutes across the country to train the younger people in rural areas with skills that make them eligible to become industrial workers.

With over 300,000 farmers committing suicide in the past 17 years, and with 42 per cent farmers wanting to quit agriculture if given a choice, the deliberate effort to keep agriculture starved of public sector funding, and thereby help the exodus process is finally becoming clearly visible. With no efforts to remove the scourge of growing indebtedness, and with over 58 per cent farmers sleeping hungry, there is not much that farmers can do but to migrate. The Census 2011 tells us that more than 2,400 farmers quit agriculture and migrate to the cities every day. Many independent estimates point to the number of people migrating to the cities is around 50-lakhs a year.

Raghuram Raman had echoed the same sentiment when he took over as Governor of the Reserve Bank of India. He had said that the real growth in India would be when we are able to move people out of agriculture into the cities. He is not the only economist to say so. Most mainline economists have been parroting the same argument for several decades now thereby influencing the public policies to ignore farming. Agriculture has disappeared from the economic radar screen of the country.

With 70 per cent of the farmers owning less than one hectare of land, and with over 40 per cent of the farmers in possession of a MNREGA job card, it only shows how uneconomical farming has become over the years. According to the survey report, an average household of five people earns Rs 3,078 a month from crop cultivation, and another Rs 765 from dairy. Add to it an average of Rs 2069 from wages/salaries and Rs 514 from non-farm activities, the total monthly income for a household stands at Rs 6,426.

In other words, crop cultivation and livestock rearing brings a monthly income of Rs 3,843 to a family. In other words, agriculture brings only 60 per cent of the monthly income for an agricultural household. If this is what the Indian farmers earn after 45 years of Green Revolution isn’t this a national shame? Does it not mean that the intensive farming techniques that were aggressively pushed in the name of technological development have failed to usher in economic prosperity for the farmers?

Although, the NSSO tells us that 57 per cent of the 15.61-crore rural households are engaged in agriculture, which means they have at least one person who does farming or has dairy animals, the number of farming families now stand at 9.02-crore. But even these agricultural households are a victim of continuous neglect and apathy. In the 11^th Plan Period, the total budgetary support for agriculture was Rs 1-lakh-crore. For the next five years of the 12^th Plan, the budgetary support was increased to Rs 1.5-lakh-crore. This year, in 2014-15, agriculture which employs 58 per cent of the population, received only Rs 24,000-crore. The industry sector on the other hand got tax concessions of Rs 5.73-lakh-crores this year.

Incidentally, even MNREGA gets a higher budgetary support than agriculture.

With agriculture being deliberately starved of funding, the deleterious impact it has on the viability of the farms was expected. The only saving grace being the Minimum Support Price (MSP) being paid to farmers. But in the past three years, MSP for wheat and rice has been raised by a paltry Rs 50/quintal every year. This is not even enough to offset the rate of inflation that the country has witnessed. On top of it, all efforts are now to dismantle the procurement system, which means removing the MSP and leaving farmers to face the vagaries of the markets. The Commission for Costs and Prices (CACP) itself has been demanding the removal of MSP for farmers and letting the markets decide the price that farmers should be getting.

What is however not being spelled out is that only 8 per cent of India’s farmers get the benefit of MSP every year. In any case, 92% of the country’s farmers remain depended on the private trade which has been ruthlessly exploiting them. Punjab farmers for instance get an assured MSP every year whereas Bihar farmers do not. Removing the MSP would mean that Punjab farmers too are forced to resort to distress sale as is the practice in Bihar. A beginning has already been made by the Food Ministry directing the State governments not to provide any bonus over and above the MSP that is announced by the Centre.

The deliberate destruction of the food self-sufficiency that has been so assiduously achieved is being attempted at a time when globally it is now recognized that food shortage will trigger the next world war. Whether it is because of the impact of climate change or the corporate control over agriculture, food is likely to be the biggest political concern in the years to come. A warning was sounded in 2007-08 when a sudden spike on food prices led to an unprecedented global food crisis resulting in ‘food riots’ in 37 countries.

1. Rest in peace, food self-sufficiency. IndiaTogether. Dec 24, 2014.

http://indiatogether.org/nsso-report-on-decline-in-agriculture-and-impact-on-farmers-agriculture

2. Destroying food self-reliance. Orissa Post. Dec 24, 2014.

http://www.orissapost.com/epaper/241214/p8.htm

3. Dismantling Agriculture. DNA Mumbai. Dec 31, 2014
http://www.dnaindia.com/analysis/column-dismantling-agriculture-2048227

4. నిజమైన ఏరువాక ఎప్పుడు? Sakshi, Hyderabad. Dec 31, 2014
http://www.sakshi.com/news/opinion/when-will-the-real-held-agriculture-sector-199793

Bharat Ratna C Subramaniam's dream of transforming agriculture needs a push

Raghupati, a farmer in Kanchipuram district in Tamil Nadu standing in the midst of his SRI rice field

Raghupati is a new age farmer. Based 105-kms from Chennai in Tamil Nadu, he farms 4 acres of irrigated land in Sirunagar in Kanchipuram district. Speaks a little bit of English, and when he told me that the farmers' club he chairs -- Sirunagar Farmers' Club -- was awarded for best performance by the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) I was not only curious but also keen to know.

The club has 17 volunteers who reach out to more than 70 farmers in the village. But that's not the only thing that is important. What is more important is the willingness with which he has been experimenting with new farming practices turning the polluted landscape into a verdant, healthy and ecologically-sustainable landscape. More keen to know about the farming practices he followed, I walked with him across the crop fields. His face beamed with pride when he showed me the healthy looking traditional rice varieties (white ponni is the rice variety) he cultivates on his farm, and that too adopting the System of Rice Intensification (popularly called as SRI) method of cultivation.

I asked, what was so special about SRI? Doesn't it require a lot of labour and seed as a result of which the cost of cultivation goes up? No, he replied. It's a wrong impression being created. Raghupati told me that SRI has resulted in 1/3rd saving of water and simultaneously an increase of 50 per cent in crop productivity. The seed requirement has come down from 30 kg/acre to 5kg/acre, and there is no additional labour required. Against an application of about 75 kg of urea per acre he has completely stopped its use while he has been able to scale down the usage of DAP fertiliser from 3 bags to one bag now.

When I told him that I don't believe your claims about input applications, he challenged me to talk to any of the farmers who now cultivate a total of 50 acres of paddy in this village. His argument is that farmers have shifted to the use of panchkavya, neem oil, cow urine based plant bio-pastes that have been effective source of major and trace nutrients and at the same time act as insect repellents. No pesticides are being used by those farmers who are members of the club.

The claims were endorsed by Mr M R Ramasubramaniyam, Executive Director of the National Agro Foundation (NAF), who along with his colleague Mr Murugan, accompanied me to the village. I have now requested them to prepare a case study of SRI in rice cultivation for all the villages in Kanchipuram district that the Foundation works in.

National Agro Foundation was set up by the late C.Subramaniam, awarded Bharat Ratna, who many consider to be the real architect of the Green Revolution. Set up in 2000, the NAF has now completed 14 years. "It was Subramaniam's dream," his son, S S Rajsekar, who is the Managing Trustee, tells me "to set up a training centre that helps take the farmers take the next logical step -- from seed to the market." The NAF now works 'directly or indirectly' in some 250 villages in Tamil Nadu besides providing services in food safety and agriculture, which includes vocational training for confectioners, hawkers and bankers.

At another village, Kamsalapuram, located about 85 kms from Chennai, I met a young and enthusiastic farmer, Thiruvengadam. He cultivates 5 acres of land in which he grows rice, brinjal, onion and chillies and also has a few native breed animals. He heads a 30-member volunteer farmers club, which reaches out to about 100 farming families in the village. Although his village has mainly small farmers, owning 1 to 1.5 acres each, the applicationn of chemical pesticides has been reduced by 50 per cent on vegetables. Instead, farmers now apply chilli+garlic+ginger paste sprayed two times to ward off worms. Plus, for sucking pest control they prepare a five leave extract, which includes leaves of datura, neem, nochi, and tumbai.

I asked Thiruvengadam how much has training helped him to become a better farmer. "What I am doing today is because of the training I got." How many times have you gone to NAF training centre, I asked. "Must be some 40 times", he replied. Accordingly, the continuous training system has helped them move to a more sustainable farming practices which has provided the fellow farmers with increased income in their hand.

Visiting the watershed village of Nugumbul village, some 100 kms from Chennai, reminded me of the famed Sukho-majri village in Haryana, which has completely transformed the village, from a typical drought affected poverty-stricken village to a prosperous village. At Nugumbul, Mr Murugan explained to me how adopting the simple water conservation techniques like gully plugging, water absorption trenches and check dams has changed the village profile. Earlier, water-melon was the major crop, and now it is rice. 100 per cent crop cultivation is now being done in this village, up from 50 er cent earlier.

The community-based water harvesting systems adopted in 4 villages by NAF has helped save 28,000 lakh litres of water in a year, changing the fate of 850 villages.

Although, the NAF has a lot of activities in food and nutrition security, women empowerment, technology transfer, veterinary, horticulture, farm machinery and water management etc, it hasn't been able to communicate its role with the people at large as well as the policy makers. Not many outside its direct association are aware of the role NAF has been quietly playing in rural transformation. Since the research and training infrastructure has already been created, and is operational, it is time to turn the NAF centre into a multi-purpose training and development centre. It has to move to the next logical step of opening up to the masses, including colleges and university students, and taking a bigger role in training and education, which can be better coordinated by not only collaborative efforts with ICAR/CSIR/banks but also with civil society groups/NGOs/colleges. Media could have been used as a strong ally in reaching out.

NAF needs a complete re-orientation in the way it has been working so far. More documentation of the work accomplished, periodic assessment studies, case studies and analysis in its areas of operations need to be published and shared. Finances are a constraint for everyone who is engaged in rural development, but a little more imagination and vision could have turned NAF into a household name. Perhaps that is what C Subramaniam envisaged. #

Farmer suicides: More than what IB can see

While a young farmer in prosperous Gujarat allegedly set himself on fire last week demanding a higher support price for cotton triggering a series of farmers’ protests across the State, the Intelligence Bureau (IB) has submitted a report to the Prime Minister Office (PMO) on the failure to seriously address the problem of rising number of farmer suicides.

According to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB) 11,772 farmers had reportedly committed suicide in 2013. In the past 17 years, close to 300,000 farmers have committed suicide.

The IB report states that farmer suicides are showing an increasing trend in Maharashtra, Telengana, Karnataka and Punjab. It is fast spreading in Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh and Tamil Nadu where farmer suicides is emerging a recent trend. While Vidharbha in Maharashtra is widely known as the suicide hot spot, the serial death dance is taking the lives of two farmers on an average every day even in the frontline agricultural State of Punjab.

Although the IB has blamed suicides on natural as well as man-made factors like pricing policies and inadequate marketing facilities among the various causes, I don’t understand the reason why IB should be getting into areas where it’s expertise is almost zero. Setting a bad precedent, the IB had earlier come out with a report accusing some non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and activists for holding up the country’s development process. It had even gone to the extent of computing the loss in terms of country’s GDP.

Let me make it clear. The IB has no expertise to measure GDP. Nor has the IB got scientific acumen and ability to understand the implications of genetically-modified crops on human health and environment or for that matter on whether or not nuclear plants are safe that it can be asked to deliver a verdict. Similarly, the IB suggestions on what needs to be done to put an end to the shameful scourge of farmer suicides show that the entire exercise is politically motivated. Otherwise there is no justification for IB to ignore its primary role of providing timely intelligence about subversive activities. Let’s not forget the IB had come in for sharp criticism for serious lapses in intelligence that led to the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks.

What the IB has said in its report on farmer suicides is nothing new. All the suggestions it has come up with have been simply collated from various committee reports, academic studies and newspaper articles. Farmer suicides is one of the most analysed subject with truckloads of academic research papers, and has led to least 20 separate central and state-level committees to the affected regions. Some popular films in Hindi and regional languages like Marathi, Telgu and Malyalam have also been made on the subject of farmer suicides.

Where the fault lies is the failure to come out with a comprehensive solution. Short-term measures like compensation to the next of the kin of the deceased, loan-waivers and relief packages, including some efforts to provide psychiatric advice to farmers, have miserably failed to stem the tide. Policymakers have refused to go beyond these ‘short-term’ measures. While numerous relief packages, including the Rs 1,100-crore package declared by Gujarat as late as on Dec 15 and Maharashtra’s demand for Rs 4,500-crore from the Centre for drought-affected farmers have been forthcoming, no sincere effort has been made to radically overhaul the intensive farming system that has led to the crisis.

Mounting debt and the inability to source bank credit is part of the problem, but it is not the primary reason for farmer suicides. It is also true that increasing foray into the cultivation of cash crops like cotton and sugarcane, and inadequate marketing facilities are among the numerous reasons, but farmer suicides is a very complex and intricately woven phenomenon that requires a much deeper understanding. It’s time to look beyond growing indebtedness, and trace the reasons that lead to the mounting burden of debt that forces farmers to succumb under pressure.

But what perhaps is being simply glossed over is the declining trend in farm incomes over the past few decades. Agriculture is no longer an economically viable activity, and several studies have shown that farm incomes have remain frozen (or declined) in the past 20 years. Even globally, studies by UNCTAD show that farm incomes have remained static for two decades if you adjust for inflation. In other words, what the farmer was getting as wheat price in 1995 is no different from what he is getting in 2014. The only difference being that while farmers in rich developed countries get direct income support and subsidies, farmers in India are left to survive on hope.

Farmers need a monthly assured income package, and not more credit. Unless, a serious attempt is made to provide more income in the hands of the farming community, I see little possibility of the serial death dance abating.

Source: ABPLive.in Dec 24, 2014

http://www.abplive.in/india/2014/12/24/article461373.ece/Farmer-suicides-More-than-what-IB-can-see

Food That's Harmful: There is enough scientific evidence to show that GM foods are harmful for human health

In a scientific study sponsored by the US National Institute of Health, researchers at the Washington State University have found in 2014 that there is always a possibility that you may develop kidney problem, ovarian disease and obesity for no fault of yours. Even if your grandparents were exposed to the pesticide Methoxychlor three generations back, you can suffer the consequences now.

In another study, Paul Winchester, a professor of clinical Paediatrics at Indiana University's School of Medicine, and also a practising neonatologist at the Riley Hospital for Children, found in one study that baby rats exposed to Atrazine, an herbicide that is banned in European countries, were born with no birth defects. But they developed problems including infertility, kidney and prostate problems, cancer and shortened lifespans as adults - and passed them on to their offspring.

Atrazine, a persistent pesticide, is widely used in India.

This study published in 2009 is shocking indeed. So far we were made to believe that the harm pesticides cause is immediately apparent. But Dr Winchester's study goes much beyond and explains how pesticides can have long-term problems in humans. Unaware of the long-term impact of some of the pesticides, I thought it would be useful to share this disturbing news report. I am sure you will agree on the urgent need for more long-term studies to ascertain the effects of pesticides before the approval for its application is given.

Why I am talking about the long-term hitherto unknown health impacts of chemical pesticides is in the light of a recent statement that Environment Minister Prakash Javadekar made in Parliament claiming that there is no scientific evidence to say that genetically-modified foods are harmful to the soil, environment and human health. Genetically-modified crops produce their own toxins within the plants and therefore are a kind of a biological pesticide. The point I am trying to make is that if the harmful impacts of chemical pesticides are now being unearthed after some 70 years of its extensive use worldwide, isn't it too early to give a safety certificate to genetically modified foods, and the harm they do to your health?

In reality, there is no scientific evidence to prove that genetically-modified foods are not harmful for your health. What Prakash Javadekar did not tell Parliament was that the all-powerful GM industry has so far ensured that there is only one human clinical trial so far. In other words there are no medical experiments conducted so as to ascertain what damage to human health can be caused by GM foods. If you don’t want to know how harmful GM foods are, how will you know the harm it can cause to your health?

Let us say that tomorrow you go to a hospital complaining of a severe pain in your stomach. The doctor can go on experimenting with all kinds of medicines but there is no way to find out whether the pain is linked to a GM food you ate. This is because there is no analytical investigation procedure perfected by the medical science to assess or quantitatively measure the presence of a foreign gene in your body and what changes it can cause.

Ever since Dr Arpad Pusztai of the Rowett Research Institute in Scotland in 1998 found that GM potatoes when fed to rats in laboratory caused lesions in the gut wall of the animal, all those scientists who dared to publish the negative results of such scientific experiments were at the receiving end of the powerful GM lobby. Instead of conducting more scientific studies to know more about the dangers and thereby clear the mist, most of these scientists were suspended, gagged and eventually lost their jobs.

Nevertheless, let us look at some of the research studies that point to the hidden health dangers that you need to know. After all, it’s you and your family’s health that is at stake.

1. In one of the only three long-term studies on GM crops, undertaken at Urbino in Italy, scientists found that rats fed with GM Roundup Ready Soy continuously for 24 months showed significant changes in liver, pancreas and testes.

2. In 2012, Prof Gilles-Eric Seralani at the University of Caen in Normandy in France published a research paper that created a scientific uproar across the globe. In this landmark study, he fed rats for two years, which is the normal lifespan of rats, with GM corn treated with a popular weed killer Roundup. The result was shocking. These rats developed mammary tumours, much bigger in size than what we normally see, and also liver and kidney diseases. This was the first time a study had been conducted on rats for their full lifespan, which corresponds to about 80 years in human life. Normally, scientific feeding trials are conducted for 90 days, like in India, which corresponds to about 20 years of human life

3. A long-term multi-generational feeding study for the Austrian Agency for Health and Food Safety in 2008 showed GM food causing low fertility and significant drop in body weight of the rats.

In another study conducted by a Russian scientist Dr Irina Ermakova, rats fed with GM soya showed a high mortality rate, stunted growth and had smaller body organs compared with the normal healthy rats fed on normal diet. Many such studies conducted by the GM companies Monsanto and Aventis also showed similar results which were later swept under the carpet.

Interestingly, the only published human clinical trial conducted at the University of Newcastle in 2004, showed that the transgenic gene passed through the human stomach and small intestines. In other words, as I said earlier, whether it causes insinuating pain in your stomach or not is something that has never been ascertained. This study was conducted for the Food Standard Agency in Britain.

I had therefore expected Prakash Javadekar to launch a comprehensive scientific study to know of the health and environmental impacts of GM crops before jumping to a hasty conclusion. Since there is no crisis on the food front that India is faced with, there could have been no better opportunity to silence the critics as well as to build confidence among the consumers about the safety of GM foods by launching a long-term multi-generation study. After all, if chemical pesticides impacts can be passed on to third generation, we need to be sure that GM foods do not cause health damage to our grandchildren.

Climate Change: Time to shift gears in agriculture

At the recently concluded G-20 Heads of the State meeting in Brisbane, host Australia tried its best to keep climate change out of the final communique. It was only after the United States and European Union exerted pressure that the final declaration had a vague statement about climate change.

The Brisbane declaration finally had a paragraph that supported strong and effective action to address climate change, consistent with sustainable economic growth and certainty for business and investment, a reaffirmed G-20 resolve to adopt the recommendations, protocol and legal instruments agreed at the 21^st Conference of Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change scheduled to be held in Paris in 2015.

The G-20 reluctance to address the global concerns over climate change comes a few days after US President Barack Obama and the Chinese President Xi Jinping, heading the two biggest polluting countries, announced a so-called promising US-China agreement on greenhouse gas emission. Accordingly, while China will make its best efforts to peak its carbon dioxide emissions by 2030, the US has set-up a target of reducing its emissions by 28% in 2030 from the commitments it made for the 2005 level.

While the US media has hailed this as a ‘potentially landmark climate change agreement’ in reality it is a sweet deal benefit both the polluting countries. The Centre for Science and Environment, New Delhi, has in an analysis shown that both the US and China have worked out a mutually convenient programme of inaction that allows both the countries the freedom to pollute.

China has to do nothing to limit or reduce its emissions for the next 16 years, by which time its per capita emissions would reach around 12-13 tons. The US, which had a target to reduce emissions by 17 per cent by 2020, will now get a breather and its per capita emissions will also equal 12 to 13 ton by 2030. In other words, both US and China have crafted a self-serving deal while the world not only mutely looks on, but also applauds.

In contrast, India’s per capita emissions which hover around 1.6 ton of carbon dioxide equivalent at present, is not expected to exceed 4 ton by 2030.

Since both US and China are responsible for more than 40 per cent of the greenhouse gas emissions, the freedom to pollute unhindered for the next 16 years has serious implications for the global climate. Needless to say worst impact of the resulting climate change is being felt by developing and least developed countries, who have hardly any role in the acerbating the crisis. Rising temperatures is leading to serious climate disruptions, resulting in melting of glaciers and the rising of ocean levels. The impact is going to be catastrophic on food and water, with many experts pointing to escalating political crisis within and among nations as a consequence.

One-third of the global greenhouse gas emissions actually come from agriculture and forestry. According to the Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR), which governs the 15 agricultural research centres, “reducing agriculture’s carbon footprint is central to limiting climate change.”Food production system, including deforestation and land-use changes, account for the release of 12,000 megatonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent into the atmosphere every year. Such a huge contribution to greenhouse gas emissions is not only leading to climatic aberrations but also necessitates adaption and mitigation technologies for the small farmers who face the brunt.

Considering the role agriculture plays in climate change, a pro-active stand on food security from G-20 was expected. Although food security figured prominently in the Seoul Development Consensus in 2010, and did get a push with the development of an Action Plan on Food Price Volatility and Agriculture under the French presidency in 2011, everything ended with the formation of the Agricultural Market Information System (AMIS). Except for the usual rhetoric and an unsuccessful attempt to create food reserves in western Africa, food security has for all practical purposes disappeared from the G-20 agenda.

In the 2013 declaration, G-20 did emphasis on the central theme of food security. The G-20 Food Security and Nutrition Framework do recognize “the importance of boosting agricultural productivity, investment and trade to strengthen the global food system to promote economic growth and job creation.” However, except for the usual talk of assistance to smallholder agriculture to boost productivity, the Framework does not talk of addressing the systemic problems that has led to global agriculture turning into a major villain of climate change. The Framework itself reads well, and does mention that business as usual may not be the right approach but still the underlying emphasis is on more of the same.

The CGIAR does admit that the food-related emissions and the impact of climate change will profoundly alter the way we grow food crops, but the G-20 Framework talks of integrating smallholders into markets. In a way, integrating farmers with global markets and bringing in more investments to enhance productivity – which is what the World Economic Forum too desires – only shows that no lessons have been learnt from the climate debacle. Intensive farming is what led to agriculture becoming the biggest contributor to climate change, and therefore it is futile to accept that more intensive farming will reduce greenhouse gas emissions in future.

As temperatures rise, and water becomes scarce, irrigated wheat yields in developing countries are feared to fall by 13 and rice by 15 per cent by the year 2050. CGIAR also estimates that production of crops like potato, banana, and other cash crops will dramatically slump. Several other studies, including those by Indian Agricultural Research Institute, too points to a bleak farming scenario in the years ahead. But strangely, while the international effort, especially by the donor agencies, is to provide financial support to civil society groups for mitigation and adapting small farmers to the effects of climate change there is no mention of any serious effort to suitably make systemic changes in the way crops are being farmed.

While it is true that the G-20 has great convening and coordinating power over other international actors, it isn’t in a position to disregard some of the principles that have failed to enhance food security. In 2008, the same prescription of linking crop production to global markets led to the global food crisis sparking food riots in 37 countries and creating food deficiencies in several parts. Moreover, the entire thrust of the food security and climate change deliberations seem to be industry-driven with hardly any space for reinventing the sustainable agro-ecological methods of farming.

The G-20 Framework on Food Security therefore needs to be redrawn based on the recommendations of the International Assessment of Agricultural Knowledge, Science and Technology for Development (IAASTD) which was an inter-governmental effort under the co-sponsorship of FAO, GEF, UNDP, UNEP, UNESCO and World Bank. This report, submitted in 2008, calls for a radical change in the ‘business as usual’ approach. #

जानी-पहचानी अनदेखी Dainik Jagran, Nov 29, 2014
http://bit.ly/16dkJYB

Why "Grow in India" too is important ...

For three years in a row, wheat farmers have received a paltry increase of Rs 50 per quintal per year in the form of minimum support price (MSP), which translates to 50 paise per kg every year. This corresponds to an insignificant 3.6 per cent increase in the price being paid to wheat farmers.

Compare it with the 7 per cent additional installment of Dearness Allowance (DA) to Central government employees in September over the existing rate of 100 per cent of the basic pay/pension to compensate for price rise, you realize the step-motherly treatment being meted to the majority farming population in the unorganized sector. Employees are getting 107 per cent DA allowance today.

In addition, as per a Centre government notification, whenever the DA crosses 50 per cent, there will be an automatic increase by 25 per cent in allowance such as Children Education Allowance, Travelling Allowance, Conveyance Allowance, Cash Handling Allowance, Risk Allowance, Bad Climate Allowance, Hill Area Allowance, Remote Locality Allowance and Tribal Area Allowance, among others. Agreed, not all employees get all these allowances but they do get some of these. In other words, the Central and State government employees are completely insured against any and all kinds of price rise.

The private sector employees too get a guaranteed income which incorporates all these allowances plus they receive hefty bonuses and shares.

But when was the last time you heard of a Children Education Allowance, a Bad Climate Allowance or a leave travel allowance or for that matter any of the above mentioned allowances being given to farmers? They are expected to meet all their expenses, including children education, daughter’s marriage, bad weather etc from the MSP they get. And the MSP is being kept nearly frozen for all practical purposes by successive governments to keep food prices in check. In other words, the entire burden of rising prices is being very conveniently passed onto to the farmers. The farmers must live in poverty and hunger to keep the middle class happy.

No wonder, several studies show that more than 58 per cent of the 600 million farmers sleep empty stomach. Ironically, the people who produce food for the country themselves go hungry.

Several times in the past, Parliament has been informed that the average monthly income of a farming family (comprising 5 people plus) in the country stands at a paltry Rs 2,115. This includes about Rs 900 per month from non-farm activities like MNREGA. In many States, including the frontline agricultural States of Punjab and Haryana, the minimum wages for workers are higher than the daily farm income. Interestingly, while the Central Government Employees Federation is demanding a minimum monthly wage of Rs 15,000 for contract workers/other unorganized sector employees; and a minimum monthly salary of Rs 26,000 to the lowest aid employees of the Central Government, there is no talk at all of providing an enhanced minimum monthly package to the farmers.

In other words, it is the country farming population – comprising 600 million people -- that forms the neo-untouchable class.

An interesting analysis has been provided by the former Punjab Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh. When it comes to farmers, there is hardly a difference between the UPA and NDA. Accordingly, while the average cumulative increase in the paddy and wheat MSP during the Congress-led UPA, between 2004 and2014, was Rs 70 per year. During the previous NDA regime 1998-2004, it was only Rs 11. What he says is a stark pointer to the continuous apathy and neglect of the farming sector under successive governments.

As of this is not enough, there is more worrisome news that awaits farmers. Ministry of Food has already directed State Governments to refrain from providing any additional bonus over the MSP announced the Centre. Madhya Pradesh, Chhatisgarh and Rajasthan governments, which provided a bonus of Rs 100-200 per quintal for the past few years, have been warned not to do so in future. In case they don’t stop the practice, the Centre will not undertake food procurement operations in those States.

What is however not being told is that the MSP benefits only 30 per cent of the farmers. Even in the case of wheat and rice, where the Food Corporation of India makes procurement from the mandis at the support price, the network of mandis is only available in 30 per cent farmers. In the remaining 70 per cent of the cultivable areas, there are no mandis as a result of which farmers have to resort to distress sale year after year. Farmers in Punjab and Haryana are in the privilege category considering the he network of mandisand procurement centres as a result of which they at least get the assured price for their produce.

Even in western Uttar Pradesh, the lack of mandis and procurement centres forces farmers to transport wheat and paddy to the nearest mandis across the border in Haryana. Like the previous Congress regime, the new BJP government in Haryana has also banned the entry of paddy flowing in from Uttar Pradesh. The plight of the UP farmers who now face the prospects of distress can well be ascertained.

Let us not forget that while MSP is announced for some 24 crops, in effect it benefits only wheat and rice farmers for it is only in these two crops that procurement is made every year. In a case filed in the Punjab and Haryana High Court, Gurnam Singh of Bhartiya Kisan Union (Haryana) has petitioned how lack of procurement hits farmers. Last year, while the MSP for sunflower was fixed at Rs 3,700 per quintal, but it was purchased for Rs 2,600-2,900 per quintal. It was added that while 48,000 quintals of sunflower arrived at the Shahbad mandi for sale, and considering the average loss of Rs 500 per quintal, it resulted in Rs 4 crores loss to farmers.

The same holds true for all crops, including sugarcane for which the State governments fix a fair price. The industry has been demanding market prices for sugarcane, which means lower prices in effect, to sustain the industry. Similarly, a strong lobby of economists is demanding the withdrawal of procurement operations in wheat and rice which effectively means doing away with MSP. The argument is that it is because of MSP that the government is forced to buy and stock huge quantities of food grains. These economists are telling that the farmers would benefit if the markets are allowed to make purchases. But what is not being told is that already 70 per cent of India’s farmers are dependent on private markets, and it is in these areas that bulk of the farm suicides take place.

Withdrawing the MSP would only force farmers to abandon agriculture in big numbers and migrate to the cities looking for menial jobs. Modi government therefore must take a realistic view of agriculture sector and makes efforts to bring prosperity in the countryside. Grow in India is no less important than Make in India. #

Source:

Why "Grow in India" too is important... Deccan Herald, Nov 11, 2014.

http://www.deccanherald.com/content/440805/why-quotgrow-indiaquot-too-important.html

Does high economic growth translate into employment?

A recent report prepared by the consultancy firm PriceWater House for the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) harps on the usual premise of boosting economic growth as the basis for job creation. Accordingly, it will still take 20 years to remove unemployment even if India grows at an annual growth rate of 9 per cent.

This is exactly what we were taught in our Economic 101 class. These textbooks have not been updated ever since these were written and prescribed for economic students. The ups and downs witnessed in the past ten years when economic growth peaked to 9.3 per cent between 2004-05 and 2009-10, and then subsequently slid to 5.3 per cent after 2010-11, and in both the periods unemployment soaring, only shows that return to high growth, if that happens, does not automatically translate to job creation.

Jobless growth is a real threat.

In the past decade, India’s annual GDP growth had been at an average of 7 per cent. Even between 2005 and 2009 when the average rate of growth was 8.5 to 9.3 per cent, a Planning Commission study shows that 14 crore people had left agriculture. Normally those who abandon farming should be joining the manufacturing sector. But even in the manufacturing sector, 5.3 crore jobs were lost. So where have these 14 crore people who quit farming and believed to trudge to the cities actually gone? My understanding is that most of these who abandoned agriculture actually stayed back in the village to become landless workers.

This is corroborated with the data coming from the National Sample Survey Organisation. The NSSO survey indicates that India's labour force was between 44.0 crore to 48.4 crore in 2011-12. The lower number indicates people who looked for work every day, while the higher points to those who joined the workforce at some point in the year. This means roughly 2.5 crore people who were looking for jobs remained unemployed. But more significantly, the NSSO tells us that only 18 per cent of those who got jobs were on a regular wage. The remaining were daily workers or contract labour or self-employed.

More recently, CRISIL, the global analytical company has in a study shown since 2007, over 3.7 crore farmers had abandoned agriculture and migrated into the cities to look for daily wage work. But in the two years – between 2012 and 2014 – when economic growth had remained sluggish, an estimated 1.5 crore have returned back to the villages in the absence of job opportunities. In other words, even the daily wage opportunities waned.

In the past ten years, when growth remained on an average pretty high – exceeding 7 per cent for the ten year period 2004-2014, only 1.5 crore jobs were created. In a country where more than 1 crore people join the employment queue every year, more than 15 crore jobs should have been created considering the high growth rate India witnessed. But with only 1.5 crore jobs created in ten years, or a mere 10 per cent of the expectation, the big question remains – will high growth result in more jobs as CII projects?

I think CII is completely off the mark. Its projection of a high growth to create more employment is aimed at seeking more financial sops and perks from the government. Let me explain. Between 2004-2005 and 2014-15, a ten year period of high economic growth averaging 7 per cent per year, the industry was given tax concessions to the tune of Rs 36-lakh-crore. These tax concessions are listed in the budget documents under the head Revenue Foregone. These massive tax concessions were doled out to the industry on the premise that it will increase industrial activity, increase exports and of course create more jobs.

Interestingly, when India was on a very high growth trajectory between 2004-05 and 2009-2010, industrial production had slumped to minus 7.20 per cent in Nov 2009. In the present year 2014, the industrial growth in the quarter ending Oct 2014, is at a paltry 2.5 per cent. Manufacturing sector on the other hand is completely in the dumps. Manufacturing sector has declined showing a growth of only 0.2 per cent in 2013-14, compared to 1.1 per cent growth a year earlier. The story of exports from India is also not cheering enough. By Oct 2014, exports from India contracted by 5 per cent due to a fall in shipments of engineering goods, gems and jewellery and pharmaceuticals. This has further widened the trade deficit indicating that more and more imports were coming in.

So if the industrial output has remained sluggish, the exports have not jumped as expected and the high growth has failed to translate into increased job opportunities, the question that needs to be asked is where has the Rs 36-lakh-crore incentive that was given to India Inc gone? If this huge subsidy given to corporate was instead invested in removing poverty, India could have easily wiped out poverty for the next 72 years. Any country that can remove poverty for 72 years will actually be able to make poverty history.

It’s therefore all a case of misplaced priorities. It is quite obvious that job creation comes in handy to seek massive financial and infrastructure support from the government.

The only bright spot in India’s growth story is actually agriculture. In 2013-14, farmers produced a record harvest of 264.4 million tonnes of foodgrains. Production of oilseeds reached a record high of 34.5 million tonnes, a jump of 4.8 per cent. Maize production increased by 8.52 per cent to reach a level of 24.2 million tones. Pulses production reached an all-time high of 19.6 million tones, an increase of 7.10 per cent over the previous year. Cotton production too touched a record high.

But strangely, its agriculture that is on the chopping block. Not forgetting that agriculture is the biggest employer, with some 52 per cent of the population directly or indirectly involved with agriculture, the thrust of the PriceWater house report should have been on how to make agriculture more profitable by bringing more money into the hands of farmers. There is a desperate need to boost public and private investments into agriculture and by gradually turning the village landscape into smart villages, the entire rural economy can be revived. This will cut down on rural-urban migration and create permanent jobs rather than push farmers to abandon farming and become casual labour in the cities. #

Where are the jobs? DNA Mumbai, Dec 3, 2014.

http://www.dnaindia.com/analysis/column-where-are-the-jobs-2040718

रोजगारविहीन विकास की कहानी Amar Ujala, Nov 28, 2014

http://www.amarujala.com/news/samachar/reflections/columns/story-of-jobless-development-hindi/

Despite high growth, where are the jobs? Deccan Herald. Dec 16, 2014.
http://www.deccanherald.com/content/447862/despite-high-growth-jobs.html#

India-US deal on food security in WTO: Postponing the search for a permanent solution

Just a few weeks back, as the Maharashtra Assembly election results poured in, Uddhav Thakre knew the crucial role Shiv Sena will play in the formation of the Maharashtra government. It was being presumed that Uddhav Thakre would be the next deputy Chief Minister in the new coalition government.

But the moment NCP announced unconditional support to the BJP, Shiv Sena lost the plot. Uddhav Thakre’s bargaining power was reduced to zero. Shiv Sena now sits in the Opposition.

You will ask me why am I narrating from the Maharashtra’s political theatre that the nation has already been a witness to when I am trying to understand the reasons behind all the enthusiasm that has been generated with India managing to seal the deal on food security with the United States at the World Trade Organisation (WTO). As we read in the newspapers, the deadlock over the signing of the landmark Trade Facilitation Agreement has been broken with India and the US claiming to have “successfully resolved” their differences on the issue of minimum support price to Indian farmers.

Let’s first try to understand what has been achieved. Commerce Minister Nirmala Sitaraman said: “We are happy that India and US have successfully resolved their differences related to the issue of public stockholding for food security purposes at WTO in a manner that addresses our concerns.” At the same time, the minister announced that show would not be making any information publicly available before it is presented to the WTO General Council scheduled to meet on Dec 10-11.

If accepted by the General Council, the bilateral agreement will pave the way for the launch of the Trade Facilitation Agreement (TFA) which aims at making simple the cumbersome custom processes, reducing costs and administrative charges in moving goods across countries, thereby making imports quick and easy. This is where the commercial interest of the rich developed countries lie and all out efforts therefore were to bypass India’s objections on first finding a permanent solution to its food security concerns.

To put it simply, the impasse over the multi-billion dollar opening that is expected once the TFA comes into force is now removed. The TFA will come into existence, latest by mid-2015, once all the diplomatic formalities are completed.

India has therefore managed to postpone the permanent solution it was looking for to the vexed issue of paying adequate food prices to its 600 million farmers which is directly linked to ensuring food security for 840 million poor people. But more importantly, like the fate of Shiv Sena in Maharashtra Assembly, India too has lost the bargaining power in the international trade forum.

The international desperation to finding a solution to India’s concern over food security was directly linked to the launching of Trade Facilitation Agreement. But once the TFA comes into existence, India’s defiant stand on protecting its food subsidies will get dissipated.

I am not saying that what India has managed to wrest from the US is not quite a step forward. After all, the Peace Clause – the period in which no member country can challenge India’s food subsidies at the Dispute Panel – has been extended from the originally agreed period of four years at the Bali WTO Ministerial in Dec 2013 to an indefinite period until a permanent solution regarding this issue has been agreed and accepted. In other words, India can go on paying farmers a minimum support price regardless of the WTO condition of keeping it within the 10 per cent permissible limit allowed as part of the Aggregate Measure of Support under the Agreement on Agriculture.

For the time being it means the US has stepped down from its arrogance and double standards in protecting the massive subsidies that it pays to its minuscule farming population but challenging the subsidy support India or for that matter other developing countries give to their small and marginal farmers constituting bulk of the farming populations. But this may perhaps be because of the larger economic interest for the US that presently lies in aggressively pushing for its exports in the developing countries. As former WTO Director General Pascal Lamy had once remarked: “For all practical purposes, the TFA will for all practical purposes mean lowering the import tariffs in developing countries by another 10 per cent.”

Nirmala Sitaraman has acknowledged that the India-US deal will end the impasse at the WTO and open the way for the implementation of trade facilitation agreement. Since the issue of food security was linked to the approval for trade facilitation agreement, I would have thought the best option for India was to find a permanent solution before making any commitment on signing the trade facilitation treaty. Now with the bargaining power gone, India may not get what it wanted. A sword of Damocles will continue to hang whether we like it or not.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had demonstrated political astuteness by standing firm on India’s question of seeking a permanent solution to its food security concerns by refusing to endorse trade facilitation by July 31. The deadline was breached and India was accused of stalling the international trade negotiations. But Prime Minister stood his ground, and rightly so. He in fact remarked that it was important for him to protect the national interests rather than look for some articles in the foreign media applauding him for going with the global stream.

The issue at stake is the minimum support price that India pays to its farmers. According to WTO, India is allowed to provide a maximum of 10 per cent of the total value of a crop as minimum support price. In case rice, against the permissible limit of 10 per cent, India provides 24 per cent. In case of wheat, it is fast approaching the 10 per cent deadline. Indian price support to farmers is actually hurting the commercial interests of US agricultural exporters. Nearly 33 such export federations are pressuring the US government not to allow any further rise in MSP for Indian farmers. They are keen that Indian farmers will be forced to get out of agriculture once farming become economically viable thereby turning India into a major food importing country. #

The near-freezing of crop prices in India is adding to farm distress

The writing on the wall is loud and clear. For three years in a row, wheat farmers have received a paltry increase of Rs 50 perquintal (100 kg) per year in the form of minimum support price (MSP), which translates to 50 paise per kg every year. This corresponds to an insignificant 3.6 per cent increase in the price being paid to wheat farmers this year.

For the paddy crop too, the price farmers got this year was Rs 50 per quintal more than what they received a year back.

Former Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh’s analysis is right on the spot. Accordingly, the average cumulative increase in the paddy and wheat MSP during the Congress-led UPA regime, between 2004 and2014, was Rs 70 per year. Before that when NDA ruled, from 1998 to 2004, it was only Rs 11. While some may say there is no difference between BJP and Congress when it comes to farmers, what is perhaps not being seen as clearly is that the era of price policy for farmers is over. No amount of shouting and sloganeering is going to be of any help now.

Not only have the successive governments for all practical purposes managed to put a cap on the MSP, internationally too there is no support for higher prices to farmers. The World Trade Organisation (WTO) is demanding the withdrawal of the procurement prices in India, and even though India is standing firm on its resolve to protect the interests of domestic farmers but back home the Ministry of Food has already directed the State governments not to provide any bonus over and above the MSP to farmers. The underlying message therefore is absolutely clear. It is only a matter of time before the government abandons the price policy in agriculture.

These developments are happening at a time when most mainline economists are blaming the hike in MSP as the primary reason for the rising food prices.

So when Punjab chief minister Prakash Singh Badal seeks a revision in wheat MSP asking for another Rs 150 per quintal, he too knows that his plea is going to fall on deaf ears. In fact, he knows it much better than anyone of us. He is under tremendous pressure to do away with massive procurement of wheat and rice that Punjab undertakes every year. Freezing MSP, and amending the APMC Act that allows setting up of private terminal markets, are the immediate steps being suggested to kill official procurement.

While all efforts are on finding ways and means to cut down on the prices that farmers’ get for their produce, compare it with the 7 per cent additional installment of Dearness Allowance (DA) to Central government employees in September over the existing rate of 100 per cent of the basic pay/pension to compensate for price rise, you realize the step-motherly treatment being meted to the majority farming population in the unorganized sector. Employees are getting 107 per cent DA allowance today.

For the government employees, the previous UPA regime had even announced setting up of the 7^th Pay Commission. No one blames the rising pay scales to be even partly responsible for rising inflation. It’s only farmers who are blamed.

Interestingly, while the Central Government Employees Federation is demanding a minimum monthly wage of Rs 15,000 for contract workers/other unorganized sector employees; and a minimum monthly salary of Rs 26,000 to the lowest aid employees of the Central Government, there is no talk at all of providing an enhanced minimum monthly package to the farmers. As per answers provided in Parliament, the average monthly income of a farming family is at a pittance -- Rs 2,115 for a household comprising 5 people on an average.

No wonder, several studies show that more than 58 per cent of the 600 million farmers sleep empty stomach. Ironically, the people who produce food for the country themselves go hungry.

It’s therefore time to shift to a more inclusive income policy for farmers. With Jan Dhan Yojna taking the reach of the banks to the poor and unreached, it should be possible to provide direct income support to farmers. Setting up a State Farmers Income Commission, and merging all agricultural subsidies into the monthly income package that a farmer receives, is the only plausible way forward. Farmer organizations as well as political leaders must see the light of the day. I don’t think even a High Court directive to extend procurement to all crops will make any difference to farmers livelihoods. Time for the Court’s too to see beyond the price policy. #

Further reading:

Farm distress looms as global crop prices crash after 10-years bull run. Indian Express. Nov 5, 2014

ttp://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-others/farm-distress-looms-as-global-crop-prices-crash-after-10-year-bull-run/

Farmers suffer, others prosper. Orissa post. Nov 5, 2014
http://www.orissapost.com/epaper/051114/p8.htm

समर्थन मूल्य में मामूली वृद्धि Dainik Jagran, Nov 8, 2014
http://www.jagran.com/editorial/apnibaat-price-11757921.html

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