Lecture 25

Benefits of Green Revolution-

i. It made India self sufficient in food grains (Provision of food security)

ii. It resulted in increasing farmer’s income which also improved industrial output.
iii. It modernized farming in India which resulted in increasing the speed of adopting to
modern technologies in Indian agriculture.
iv. Surplus production of food helped in solving nutrition issues relatively better in India.
v. It increased employment opportunities in agriculture because it could end mono
cropping and technological improvements assured higher demand for labour due to
more intensive cultivation.

Challenges of green revolution-

i. It increased inter farmer inequality because relatively rich farmers gained more.
ii. It increased inter regional inequality because there was very high benefit in states like
Punjab, Haryana, Western UP, Tamilnadu and coastal regions of AP but relatively low
growth in Bihar, Rajasthan, Eastern UP, MP and Odisha.
iii. It resulted in excessive use of fertilizers and pesticides along with intensive irrigation
technique which depleted the water table and removed soil fertility in many regions.
Therefore, green revolution proved to be environmentally unsustainable in the long run.
iv. It resulted in discouraging institutional reforms in agriculture.
v. It resulted in increasing cost of cultivation in agriculture because farmers had to buy
inputs like fertilizers, pesticides, irrigation facilities etc which increased cost of doing
business and therefore risk in agriculture.

Evergreen Revolution-

It is a concept which suggests that agricultural policies should be designed to achieve increase in
output without harming natural capital so that agricultural development remains sustainable. It
can be achieved by technological reforms and institutional reforms.

Technological reforms-

a. Soil management reform-

i. Promoting more information about nutrients in soil. (Judicious use of fertilizer)
ii. Promoting knowledge about moisture content of soil (Better crop choice)
iii. Information about humus content of soil by proper mixing of soil (retains soil
fertility)
b. Irrigation and water management reforms-
I. It includes demand side reforms i.e., rationalising demand for water use for
irrigation. This is done by reducing wastage of water by choosing correct irrigation
techniques. It also includes developing proper cropping system i.e., only crops
suitable to the region are grown to avoid undue pressure on water usage. Supply
side reforms are also needed for water management. This can be done by desiltation
of canals, managing irrigation through local sources like small check dams, village
 ponds, recharging the rivers etc. It can also be done by rainwater harvesting to
assure ground water table is kept at a safe level.
c. Seed management-
i. Seed management requires proper storage facility, proper distribution facility and
facility to grow better quality seeds for higher development.

Institutional reforms-

a. Financial market reforms-

It requires cheaper credit through formal banking system to farmers, especially small and
marginal farmers to assure that they take small risks to follow crop diversification. It also
requires insurance supports to make sure that farmers are compensated in case of sudden crop
loss. This will encourage production of high value crops like horticulture.
b. Developing crop protection techniques and extension support-
Crop protection includes both fencing to protect from animals and taking steps to provide
protection from pest attack. Extension services include spread of information regarding weather
report, market facility, crop treatment etc. All of which can increase production with less use of
inputs.
c. Post-harvest reforms-
This consists of developing better connectivity to the market, giving permission to the farmers
to sell in open market, providing storage facilities to avoid distress sale of crops, better drying
facilities for crops and faster information regarding expected price in the market.

Yellow revolution-
Fill from office.

Operation flood was initiated in 1970 with establishment of national diary development board. It
was mainly focused on increasing milk production through development of farming cooperatives,
promotion of higher amount of procurement from even remote areas and comparatively smaller
amount to process it and sell it in the market. It also developed skimmed milk and milk powders to
increase self-life of milk in the market.

Benefits-

i. It made India largest producer of milk in the world and increased nutrition security.
ii. It became an additional source of income for farmers especially in dry land regions.
iii. It increased empowerment of small and marginal farmers.
iv. High milk production has also resulted in improving food processing in India giving
higher returns to farmers.

Blue revolution-

Blue revolution refers to very high growth in fish production and marine output production in India,
especially after 2006.Post 2006 national fisheries development board was given statutory and
autonomous status. It has taken steps to modernize fishing industry, developing better marketing
support, and training farmers in use of modern technology. Marine production and fishery
production has increased at 9% per annum between 2006 and 2014 and then at 11% between 2014
and 2022. India’s exports of fishery products were worth 8 billion dollars in 2021-22. Increase in
productivity has improved income for farmers especially in coastal regions. It has also increased
shrimp exports making India one of the largest exporters of Shrimp.

The major challenges are-

i. Fishing of larva which is banned by the government.

ii. Lack of storage capacity leads to high cost and wastage.
iii. Large extraction in international waters which is contiguous to India’s exclusive
economic zone results in losses for India.
iv. Lesser availability of logistical support has resulted in less development of aquaculture
which has huge potential in India.

Lecture-26

Land reforms in India-

i. Abolition of zamindars
ii. Security of tenants/Tenancy reforms
iii. Land ceiling
iv. Land consolidation

Land reforms were introduced in India with a special act in 1948 under which the government
declared abolition of zamindari. The objective of zamindari abolition was to remove intermediary for
tax collection between government and farmers. Under this reform zamindar’s rights of tax
collection from farmers and his rights over common village property were abolished. Common
village grounds under the control of zamindar were confiscated and distributed among landless
farmers.

Benefits-

i. Excessive tax burden put on the farmer by the zamindar were abolished.
ii. Administrative control of zamindar on land which resulted in exploitation of tenants
was abolished.
iii. Redistribution of land among poor farmers reduced asset inequality to a great extent.

Challenges of the reform-

i. Landlords still held large portion of land under their ownership.

ii. Landlords still directed the rural system because of their historical control on common
grazing land, village mills etc.

Tenancy reforms-

They were mainly executed in Kerala, West Bengal and Jammu and Kashmir. It consists of three
parts.
 a. Security of demure- Before independence the tenants were routinely evicted from land
without any major reason, government made a rule post-independence that if a tenant is
evicted then it can only happen if landlord will do personal cultivation and even then, the
landlord will have to pay compensation to the tenant.
b. Reduction in rent-
Rent before independence was as high as seventy five percent in certain areas, this was
reduced to a maximum of 33% after independence, however some states like Punjab and
Tamilnadu increased it to 40%.
c. Ownership rights for the tenants-
The government provisioned that if a tenant cultivated the land for a given period (fixed by
state government) then some part of land will belong to the tenant.

Benefits-

i. It gave more security to the tenants.

ii. It reduced the pressure of excessive rent on tenants.
iii. It provided a hope to the tenants which was achieved in West Bengal “Operation Barga”
and Kerala.

Challenges-

i. Lack of land records resulted in very low level of information on tenancy.

ii. Presence of oral tenancy resulted in inability to implement the law.
iii. Delays by state government in fixing the law like determination of compensation made it
ineffective.

Land ceiling-
When government fixes an upper limit on amount of land holding that an individual or a family can
keep then it is called land ceiling. Land ceiling act was passed on recommendation of S.
Radhakrishnan committee which recommended that maximum land holding should be fixed at 15
acres per adult in a family, any surplus land should be surrendered to the government and state
government can fix compensation for landlords for taking away their land. This land should be
redistributed among landless peasants and small farmers. Plantation land and land for commercial
use should be exempted from the list.

Benefits-

i. It put pressure on big landlords to change ownership rights on land.

ii. Some land could be redistributed among vulnerable sections of society.

Challenges-

i. Lack of land records made implementation difficult.

ii. Anonymous land holdings were created to avoid ceiling.
iii. Redistributed land was repurchased at a low price.
iv. Some people declared their waste land under this act and even collected the
compensation from the government.
Land Consolidation-
The objective is to assure that people can bring contiguous land under single ownership which could
promote mechanisation and use of modern technology on the field. This must be achieved by
shifting small land holders to another land owned by the larger land holder. However, this scheme
was a complete failure because not even 5% land could be covered under this. The main reasons
were

a. Land quality was not similar in all the regions.

b. It was seen as beneficial for large farmers.
c. It was ignoring sentimental attachment of farmers to their land.

Agricultural subsidies-
i. Price subsidy-
a. Minimum Support Price (Price floor)-
The price at which government provides an assurance that they will buy farmer’s
produce.
b. Procurement Price-
The price at which government will purchase agricultural product for its own
purpose of meeting food security or raw material requirements.
c. Issue price-
The price at which government will release food grains from godowns of FCI.

MSP can be fixed based on cost incurred by the farmer in production. There are 3 possible methods
of measuring the cost.

a. A2 = It includes all payments made by farmers on hired factors of production like payment of
wage, rent, interest and expenditure on raw material.
b. A2 + FL = Family labour (estimated cost)
c. C2 = A2 + FL + Estimated rent of owner-occupied land + estimated interest on capital supplied
by owner

In 2005, M.S Swaminathan commission suggested 1.5 times C 2, however on recommendations of

Dalwai committee MSP was fixed at 1.5 times A 2 + FL. After fixing MSP it has been observed that
payments have continuously increased. However, challenges remain in MSP.

i. It is tilted heavily towards wheat and rice which have open procurement while other
crops have closed procurement.
ii. It is mainly used by large farmers because small farmers are not informed and they don’t
have the surplus to produce.
iii. It creates inter regional inequality because those states which have a strong
procurement system can purchase higher amount compared to other states.
iv. Higher MSP can lead to higher inflation.
v. MSP is an indirect subsidy and it is considered against WTO rules.

Therefore reforms in APMC system will be needed to promote better functioning of agricultural
subsidies.