TUESDAY 29 September, 2020 Pages 08, Faridabad Delhi (NCR)
Farm laws to bring more freedom better prices Daily E-Paper m
Pratyasha Mohanty
www.theasianchronicle.com m email id: asianchronicleindia@gmail.com m www.facebook.com/asianchronicle
Agriculture, which employs half of India's population, has long been in desperate need of reform. The protests by opposition parties and some farmers’ organisations arised from false accusations that the new laws mean abolition of minimum support prices and procurement by central and state governments. As the opposition parties claimed freedom to sell will meant the end of government procurement at MSPs. But that is not true . The government will continue procuring some of the produce at MSPs just to get the grain for ration shops. On the samtime now a days farming is an unattractive occupation. One can not earn a decent income from their tiny farms.Since small farms of grains and cereals will not
yield a decent income, small farmers are shifting to animal husbandry, vegetables, and fruit. These yield more income from less land. As per the survey we can see that 42% of farmers want to move out of it. Between 1970-71 and 201516, the number of farms more than doubled from 71 million to 145 million while the average farm size more than halved from 2.28 hectares to 1.08. The new law allows private buyers to hoard essential commodities for future sales, which only government-authorised agents could do earlier , which can be achieved when groups of farmers will have contracts with agro-processors because contract farming will create scale economies for farmers and ensure a minimum price. Moreover any farmer can opt into or out of contract farming. Over two
decades, ITC has set up e-choupals, procurement centres with electronic information enabling farmers to track prices at mandis and foreign markets, satisfying themselves they are getting a fair price. Beside these the buying corporations will have a high incentive to provide farmers with the best new technologies and farm practices, something government extension services have failed miserably to do. Meanwhile the new law also give farmers freedom to sell their produce anywhere in India. In simpler term one would be free to earn or sell goods or services anywhere in India, or only in places designated by state governments, only after paying middlemen a commission, and only after paying a tax to state government. Farmers must be as free as non-farmers to buy and sell
anywhere in India. Because most Indian farmers currently sell the majority of their produce at government-controlled wholesale markets or mandis at assured floor prices. As per economist Ajit Ranade, "Giving the freedom to the farmer to sell outside the mandi system, to whoever, is a welcome step, in unshackling the farmer." By observing the conditions globally we can see that if the government guaranteed price is above international levels, this will induce a glut for which there is neither domestic nor foreign demand. For instance when the European Union used to have high farm support prices that created bulk of unsold meat and butter and milk, then they were ultimately sold at a huge loss to the Soviet Union. Now the EU has shifted mainly to direct in-
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come support for farmers. Similarly in India Telangana’s Rythu Bandhu scheme (Rs 10,000/acre) and Modi’s PM- Kisan scheme (Rs 6,000 per acre and Odisha’s KALIYA yojna. Best is Odisha's Kaliya jojna which is not only providing cash transfers of about Rs 10,000/acre to landowners but also to the tenants and sharecroppers; and Rs 12,500 to landless households to start poultry, goat-rearing and fisheries; and Rs 25,000 over five years for small and marginal farmers to buy inputs; and many more insurance benefits. Experts agree that in a country where agriculture employs so many millions, leaving farmers' fates to the vagaries of the market cannot be the only answer. So the laws need to be implemented with an utter precision for the sake of betterment of the farmers.