The fact that monsoon has been erratic, and woefully inadequate in several parts of the country has been extensively reported as headline news. Several papers have also made ‘alarmist projections’ and stated that the specter of hunger and drought is about to visit India again. However what has not been reported with equal vigour and intensity is the prompt action which the Central and state governments have taken to address the issues.
The point to note is that even though the aggregate rainfall deficit in the country is over 55% (at the time of writing this article) the area that has been left out of cultivation is less than 12%. This means that the country has been able to ‘monsoon – proof’ its agriculture to a large extent. It is true that this will be achieved at very high economic and ecological costs, and these will have to be offset by higher procurement prices , input subsidies and natural resources regeneration programmers to ensure that in the long run, the water table is not affected beyond redemption. The point being made here is that while ‘nature’ does have an important role in determining the production strategies, the role of government is no less. If Punjab and Haryana ( the two leading contributors to the nation’s food surplus kitty) have been able to achieve over 90% transplantation of paddy, the credit has to be given both to the farmers, and the governments’ foresight and political commitment to ensure adequate power for the pump sets and the availability of diesel. While many newspaper columns, especially those printed on pink paper, have often been critical of the free power supply to the farmers, can we imagine the counterfactual : with over 60% deficiency in rainfall in Punjab and Haryana, the food prices would have literally pierced the roof!
The Government of India (ministry of Agriculture and Co-operation ) started looking at rainfall data early during the Kharif season, and asked the states to take contingent action to address the issues. Even before the state governments held their first assessment meetings to ensure that the production losses in Kharif are minimized, and steps taken to enhance and optimize the Rabi production, the central governments announced plans to ensure that farmers’ incomes are protected by announcing a higher procurement price for paddy, and reduction in input costs, including diesel subsidy. But more important that any one of these individual measures has been the frankness and willingness to engage in a dialogue with he state governments at all levels. The Prime Minister and the Cabinet Secretary held a meeting with he Chief Secretaries of state governments(8/8/09) where the lead presentation was made by the Union Agriculture Secretary ,Mr T Nand Kumar, in which he discussed the current crisis – but also spoke of the opportunities that emerged. This meeting was significant for several reasons : first an all India assessment became possible, second the best practices from the states could be exchanged, and third, perspectives from different production systems were brought to the table, and last but not the least , a consensus emerged that even as investments in agricultural research and development had to be spread evenly, the regions that had reached a level of prosperity could not rest assured on laurels of the past. The telling point was made by the Chief Secretary of Punjab when he said that in normal years, the mantra is of crop diversification, but it just takes one year of erratic rainfall for everyone to revert to the chant of ‘food security first’.
This has been followed by a conference of the Union Agriculture Minister with he Agriculture and Horticulture Ministers of all the states(21/8/09) -thereby signaling that the country stands together to take on the drought like situation. The Agriculture Ministers have not accepted the Ministry of Fertilizers plea that the states should manage the fertilizer movement logistics on their own, and that the Ministry would restrict itself to price support mechanisms. They have also pointed out the practical difficulties in implementing the diesel subsidy schemes under which farmers in districts where there was a rainfall deficit of 50% till July 15 would get a diesel subsidy of up to Rs 1000/ on production of receipts, They suggested that rather than getting into the macro management of such subsidy schemes which will not only be time consuming, but also amenable to gross manipulation, interest subvention for all districts where the rainfall has been less than 50% till July 15 would be a better idea. The ultimate purpose is to bring down the costs of cultivation – and the best way to achieve this is by providing cheaper credit and higher procurement prices. This column has stressed time and again, that rather than have a multiplicity of schemes which become an administrative Pandora’s box, it is better to focus on the Kisan Credit card and the procurement price as the two main policy instruments to improve the viability of farming. The one argument that goes against this policy is that as against 13 crore farmers, only about 6 crore farmers have the KCC, and public procurement does not have the capacity to extend its reach to the remote and difficult areas. The better option then is to resolve the issues in these two areas, viz , credit and procurement – rather than take the most circuitous route to achieve the objective.
AgriMatters would like to end on a positive note. These consultations have not only identified the problems, but also recommended better alternatives. And it does appear that there is a general consensus that things can, and will improve….where there is a will, there’s a way !