Economists plead for pol agenda for agri turnaround
Posted by Labels: Agriculture and Farming, Agriculture Policies and Reforms, India
Observing that the agriculture sector in India has been sliding down for past several decades, an economist panel today advocated for a political agenda to ensure turnaround of the core sector on which about 70 percent population is dependent.
"There is a need for a political agenda to restore agriculture as a pre-dominant economic sector by giving it all the inputs, subsidy and other infrastructure to make farming a sustainable proposition," the economists said at a seminar 'Agrarian Crisis in India' organised by the CPI to coincide with its 21st national party congress.
"There has been a typical insensitivity and apathy among the Indian ruling class and elites towards the agrarian situation in the country," rued former Union Finance Secretary S P Shukla.
There has been a steep rise in the cases of farmers' suicide in the states in Northern, Southern and Eastern parts of the country as agriculture appeared to have given way to the industry and service sector as core economic activity, Shukla, who was an Indian representative at the multilateral GATT talks in 1990s, said.
Another economist, Praveen Kumar, Jha of the JNU said a lot of factors like the government's reduced share in inputs, credit and pricing of farm produces were responsible.
The public spending on agriculture sector has shrunk to six percent of the GDP in 2009 as against 14 percent in 1985, he said.
A Former Patna University teacher and an economist, Nawal Kishore Chaudhary, alleged that the political class in Bihar have been opposed to land reforms apparently under pressure from the landed gentry.
Chaudhary also suggested formation of cooperatives of the farmers for cultivation and marketing of their farm produces for better renumeration in view of success of similar institutions elsewhere in the country.
If the Sudha Dairies, a cooperative of milk produces, can become a success story then there was no reason that the farmer and allied sectors cannot benefit from such institutions, he said.
The senior CPI leader Atul Kumar Anjaan stressed for increase in public finance and other measuers for agriculture promotion and asked the Centre to review its decision to reduce subsidy to farm inputs like fertilizers, seeds and diesel.
Another Delhi-based economist Jaya Mehta advocated for inclusion of women among the farmers and acknowledgement of their works at home and in the fields as helpers and even farmers so that their miseries too could be accounted for.
Press Trust of India
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