New Delhi: Union Minister Hardeep Puri said that the budget of the Department of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare has increased more than six times during the last six years.
He said that by implementing the recommendations of the Swaminathan Committee, Prime Minister Narendra Modi has increased the MSP by 1.5 times the cost of production. He said that the amount spent on procurement on MSP has increased by 85 percent in 2014-19 as compared to 2009-14.
The MSP for all major crops has been increased by 40–70 percent in 2020–21 compared to 2013–14. He said that compared to last year, this year 25 percent more paddy has been procured on MSP in Punjab and this is 20 percent more than the purchase target of this year. He said that a sum of Rs 1,10,000 crore has been transferred directly to the accounts of farmers through the PM Kisan Yojana and till now farmers have to be paid crop insurance of Rs 87,000 crore at a premium of just Rs 17,450 crore. Already happened.
The Union Minister said that in 1950, India’s agricultural sector contributed about 52 percent of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP), while about 70 percent of the country’s population had employment in it. He said that till 2019, about 42 percent of the population in the region had employment, but its contribution to GDP was only 16 percent. At the same time, its annual growth rate is just 2 percent.
Referring to a 2018 study of the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development, Mr. Puri said that 52.5 percent of the total farm households had an average debt of $ 1,470 (about Rs 1.08 lakh). He said that 30 percent of our agricultural production is destroyed due to lack of suitable cold storage infrastructure.
He said that because of this the supply chain remains weak and as a result consumers do not have much choice of products, waste is high and prices fluctuate a lot. He said that Indian farmers are also heavily dependent on factors like climate change, markets, middlemen and lack of necessary infrastructure.
Puri said that these reforms were also recommended by leading agricultural economists, which allowed our farmers to sell their crops in the open market. He said that some Indian states had also adopted and implemented these reforms years ago. Bihar is an example of this, where the growth rate of agriculture remains at 6 percent as compared to the national average of just 2 percent.
Puri stressed that the government has repeatedly requested to help farmers to talk and address their concerns. He said that states would be allowed to tax the mandis. At the same time, the government has made a time-bound dispute resolution mechanism and the government has also agreed to allow cases related to disputes to be taken to civil courts.