Do it yourself

The much publicized and even more widely criticized Rs20trn Self Reliant India economic recovery package has laid significant emphasis on the farm sector reforms. The following 10 key promises have been made as part of the package. 1.     Essential Commodities Act to be amended to enable better price realization for farmers by attracting investments and making agriculture sector competitive. 2.     A central law to be enacted to provide for inter-state trade and framework for e trading of agriculture produce. 3.     The government to facilitate appropriate legal framework for an enforceable standard mechanism for predictable prices of crops at the time of sowing (some sort of contract farming or forward pricing mechanism). 4.     Financing facility of Rs.1Lakh Cr to be provided for funding Agriculture Infrastructure Projects at farm gate & aggregation points (Primary Agricultural Cooperative S...

Continuing from last week - 3yr transformation agenda - did it work? The NITI Aayog's 3yr agenda for transformation for agriculture sector recognized that "Enhancing agricultural productivity requires of efficiently using inputs, introducing new technologies and shifting from low to high value commodities." The data available for first two years (FY18 and FY19), indicates that little progress has been made in implementation of the proposed transformation agenda. The following points are pertinent to note in this context: (a)    The share of agriculture sector in total GVA has fallen from 17.9% in FY17 to 16% in FY19. In Fy15, it was 18.2%. (b)    The horticulture crops' production grew from 300643MT in FY17 to 313851MT in FY19, an average annual growth rate of ~2%, much lower as compared to ~3.5% growth seen food grain production in FY18. Fruit production and productivity both fell in FY19. The productivity of vegetables, flower and plant...