NEW DELHI: The quickest, surest and the most cost effective mode of reducing poverty, unemployment and economic disparity in India is to exploit the hitherto untapped potential of the agricultural sector, says the Federation of Indian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (FICCI).
Due to the ad-hoc nature of the policies and programmes adopted to date, 60 per cent of the productivity in the farm sector and 22 per cent of the total cultivable land remains unutilised, says FICCI in a background paper on a workshop, “restructuring of Indian agricultural policy”, to be held here on August 29,1990.
The workshop is being organised under the Aegis of the “Wednesday group” of FICCI and the economic and scientific research foundation (ESRF).
According to FICCI, the formation of a long term national agricultural policy is essential to save India from economic ruin and resulting social upheavals. ~ The disappointing performance of Indian agriculture, despite rich natural resources and cheap labour, has led to a decline in productivity. At present productivity in agriculture is estimated at only two thirds of the rest of the world, says the paper.
Highlighting this, the paper says the farmers have become poorer in real terms than they were prior to the green revolution. Coupled with this is an increasing unemployment, a worsening balance of payments situation and mounting external debts in the country, the paper observed.
Given this scenario, the paper argues for a doubling of the farm output in the next 15 years. To achieve this, the sector has to grow at an average annual growth rate of 4.7 percent, necessitating a gross capital formation of the order of 21.2 percent of the value added in agriculture.
Further, to correct the lopsided development special attention needs to be provided to both the backward areas and the impoverished small farmer.
To achieve an equitable development, a package of incentives including new techniques of production, provision of adequate loans and efficient marketing arrangements for the produce have to be made available to the farmer, the paper says.
Area specific approach, with the selection of a crop most suited for the area and an irrigation system combining the traditional and modern systems should also form part of the new approach, it argues, Further, it has called for a reorientation of agricultural research, since a closer contact between researchers and farmers is essential, given the vastness of the country, diversity of agro- climatic conditions and the inadequacy of the existing research facilities,
Article extracted from this publication >> September 7, 1990
