Submitted by Gonela Krishna Vamsy – M2022LSP007-M.

A-Labour studies and Practice

FC2 -INDIA’s DEVELOPMENTAL CHALLENGES

Section B

Q3. Write a reflective note on the nature and causes of current agricultural problems in India and its
effect on livelihoods and job creation in rural areas.

“If agriculture goes wrong, nothing else goes right”- MS Swaminathan

Agriculture is the mainstay of the rural economy, with agriculture employing 43% of the total
workforce of the country(NSSO 2019). India has moved away from being dependent on food grain
imports to becoming a nation with food security and a leading exporter of food grains.

However agriculture suffers from many problems from inputs and production to marketing,
export and finding a remunerative value for farm produce. Farm distress, fragmentation of land holding
with 86% farmers being small and marginal (Agricultural Census 2020), distorted cropping pattern due
MSP, weak forward linkages with corruption in APMC mandis, lack of mechanization and a resultant
stagnant agricultural contribution at about 16% of GDP. The nature and causes of current agricultural
problems encompass a complex mix of political, social, economic and technological factors.

The colonial legacy with exploitative land revenue systems has left agricultural sector
impoverished and backward. On the political front, land reforms expect for the abolition of zamindari
have not yielded the desired result. Only a miniscule progress has been made on redistribution of land
due to challenges in implementing land ceiling and tenancy reforms.

Access to formal credit sources is still a problem for many farmers due to lack of conclusive land
titling and more so in case of women farmers who do not have land in their name. Regional disparities
also exist in formal credit disbursement with North East region receiving only 1% of the total formal
credit(Shanta Kumar Committee). This leads to borrowing from informal sources and miney lenders and
puts the farmers in a vicious debt cycle of low productivity, low incomes and increased debt burden.

Fragmentation of land holdings with 86% small and marginal farmers hinders measures towards
scaling up production by mechanization and adoption of technological innovations. This hinders
improvement in productivity.(eg:4000 litres of water being used in India as against 1500 litres used in
China for production of 1 kg of rice). Also due to lack of collective bargaining power, farmers are not
able to get past the intermediaries of APMC mandis to sell their produce. This adds to the woes of the
farmers to increase their income to pay off debt.

The success of green revolution with high yielding varieties and fertilizers improving productivity
is concentrated in few pockets of the country like Western Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Haryana, Coastal
Andhra Pradesh. Also only the forward and the well to do sections of the society were able to reap the
benefits of the green revolution. Though green revolution made India a food secure nation, many
challenges have become visible like over irrigation, alkalinity and loss of soil fertility and cereal centricity
at the cost of nutrition and other crops like pulses, millets etc. Also green revolution gave rise to bullock
capitalists(Rudolph and Rudolph) and led to the second democratic upsurge( Yogendra Yadav). This
created an influential peasant pressure group that has impacted the agricultural price policy(MSP) and
also hindered any transformative changes in agriculture( 3 Farm Acts being repealed after farmers
agitation).

Since agriculture is non remunerative with disguised unemployment, this leads to male out
migration from rural to urban areas. This leads to feminization of agriculture in rural areas and to
problems of migration such as slums, poor working conditions etc in urban areas. Debt burden,
inadequate incomes and poverty in rural areas entrenches inequalities in rural areas in form of bonded
labour , patriarchal attitudes, caste pre judices.

Other persistent problems include Indiscriminate and unscientific use of fertilizers, MSP
beenfititng only 6% of farmers (Shanta Kumar committee) , lack of transport connectivity and cold
storage facilities and low value addition.

To address the problems in agriculture, steps as suggested by Dalwai committee on doubling

farmers income to transform agriculture into a sustainable enterprise and farmer into agripreneur needs
to be done by increasing investment in agriculture, adopting best practices in irrigation like Israeli
methods, improving input use efficiency, crop diversification and increasing seed replacement rate and
cropping intensity to make best use of limited natural resources needs to be done. NITI Aayog’s Model
Land leasing Act and Model APMC Act and incentivizing states to adopt these Acts needs to be done.

Dissemination of knowledge about productive agricultural practices is being done through

Agristack by leveraging digital technology. More APMC mandis should be brought under e-NAM(e –
national agricultural markets). Initiatives like PM Fasal Bima Yojanafor crop insurance, PM KISAN for
credit needs, PM KSY for micro irrigation, kisan credit card, paramparagat krishi vikas yojana for organic
farming , formation of farmer FPOs , agricultural mechanization and promotion of agricultural start ups,
soil health cards and farming based on agro climatic zonation should be executed effectively to enhance
productivity and to efficiently utilize the natural resource base in a sustainable manner. Integrated
farming system that combines agriculture with animal husbandary and fisheries using scientific methods
as envisaged in A 48 needs to be promoted to improve resilience to external shocks of agri markets and
the vagaries of climate change.

Promoting food processing industries in rural areas should be a priority because it not only adds
value to agricultural produce and increases farmers income but also creates jobs, promotes exports and
sustains livelihoods in rural areas.