The Hindu Business Line : Real shine must come from farm sector

The Government must look at agriculture as the principal orphan of the reform process that began more than a decade ago. If there is one important lesson to be learned from the experience of the so-called Green Revolution, it is that the high-input technology is simply unsustainable. India can only shine when its farms do too, not only when the Bombay Stock Exchange does, says K. P. Prabhakaran Nair

A farmer picking cotton at a field in Kurnool district, Andhra Pradesh... a lonely struggle. — Arunangsu Roy Chowdhury

IT IS difficult to restrain anyone, especially in the UPA coalition, from waxing eloquent on the "achievements" of the nearly two-year-old government in New Delhi. Going by the way the stock market was booming, the 10,000 mark was only sure to be hit, sooner than later.

Exactly three years ago, this is what tempted the NDA Government to come out with the `India Shining' slogan, prior to the polls. . The market seems to be the only parameter for "achievements". No one seems to be minding the farm. Let us look at the distress signals.

The wheat buffer stock in the Food Corporation of India has come down to a historic low. The Government, it seems, has no plan in place, should there be an emergency between now and April 1, which is when the new harvest will arrive in the mandi. The stock is insufficient to meet even a day's national need, if one goes by the norm of 500 grams of food per capita per day, set by the National Institute of Nutrition, Hyderabad.

Open market wheat prices are galloping in New Delhi at Rs 1,350 a quintal and that means more than Rs 15 for a kilo of atta. Whether the Rs 100-plus salary of a daily wage earner, living in a Delhi slum can make ends meet for his family, with 2-3 children, does not seem to be the concern of the Agriculture Minister.

The decision to slash the food subsidy bill, with the concomitant cut in the quantity of food made available to the poor and then reversing the decision, until up to the date of the impending elections in some crucial States, speaks volumes for the food management policies shaped by the mandarins in New Delhi. It clearly shows that food is, indeed, a weapon — as the former US President Richard Nixon once said.

Notwithstanding the recent statement of the Prime Minister during the 93rd Science Congress, about ushering a "second Green Revolution", several farmers are either committing suicide because they are debt-ridden, given the unsustainable "high input technology" — the hallmark of the so-called Green Revolution — or simply abandoning agriculture and moving out, as is happening even in Punjab.

Entire villages are being put up for sale in the Vidarbha region of Maharashtra. According to the latest data provided by the National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO), more than 40 per cent of farmers are keen on quitting agriculture.

In Palakkad district, Kerala, the "rice bowl" of the State, prime paddy land is being sold to NRIs from oil-rich Gulf countries to build flats and houses.

The indifference of the Government to the disappearance of rice fields is shocking. Wetlands, where rice grows, flush out all the poisons in the soil systems, whereas the concrete jungles will only aggravate environmental and soil degradation. No one seems concerned about these environmental atrocities.

The Andhra Pradesh Government, where most of the cotton farmers' suicides took place, primarily because of the failed cotton crop, has moved the courts against the MNC with the Monopolies and Restrictive Trade Practices (MRTC) Commission.

Gujarat too, where cotton is a principal earner for the farmer, is to follow suit. Interestingly, New Delhi has endorsed the move.

A critical analysis of rural poverty will show that food is at the centre of much tragedy. When rural households have to spend more than 55 per cent of their income on food alone, something is definitely wrong with agricultural planning.

The oft-repeated statement of the agricultural "messiahs", that it is the lack of purchasing power and not insufficiency of food per se which is the problem, simply does not wash.

If the agricultural fraternity, in particular the plant breeders, had come out with wheat and rice varieties with superlative yield capabilities, India, with a total cereal yield around 150 million tonnes (the figure normally put out by the Agricultural Ministry includes pulses as well, which is apart from the staples such as rice and wheat) we would not be languishing behind China which harvested more than 550 million tonnes of food last year.

For a population differential of just about 300 million plus, this is a gap that India can never hope to bridge in the foreseeable future, and a lackadaisical population policy adds to the woes. The annual rate of food production of around 1.6 per cent is trailing behind an annual rate of population increase close to 1.9 per cent.

The NSSO survey shows that the monthly per capita expenditure (MPCE) of farm households across India was just Rs 503 in 2003. And when only Rs 17 goes for education and Rs 34 for health, it is only a sad reflection of the kind of Green Revolution that has been in operation for more than four decades. The Prime Minister, the Finance Minister and the Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission would be overjoyed to have a GDP of around 8 per cent. But it is important to realise that this growth rate is despite agriculture languishing at 1.5 per cent.

In November last year the Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) rolled out the red carpet, to invite private capital into its vast network of research institutes for "rapid commercialisation" of agriculture. And the just released recommendation of the Union Ministry of Food Processing Industries to allow 51 per cent of foreign direct investment (FDI) will further accelerate the process of converting India's agriculture to agri-business, throwing millions of farmers out of work to add to the swelling numbers of urban unemployed.

Contract farming, as it is generally known, will crush the traditional farmer. The contract farmer is unmindful of what happens to the soil base, as long as the productivity is high. High-input technology is here to stay. India is clearly following the agricultural policies of the US and the European Union (EU), which have been propped up by huge subsidies. Here, it is subsistence farming — a combination of annuals, biennials, perennials, livestock etc., and not the input-intensive mechanical farming of the West, that is the most sustainable form. But India is beginning to follow the wrong model that will strike at the very root of sustenance because the market takes precedence over everything else.

The authorities in New Delhi must look at agriculture as the principal orphan of the reform process that began more than a decade ago. If there is one important lesson to be learned from the experience of the `Green Revolution,' it is that the high-input technology is simply unsustainable. Be it the seed, the fertilisers or the pesticides, the "package of practices" — dished out by the farm fraternity from results obtained on their experimental farms — is nothing but an artefact that only drives up the cost of production.

And none, least of all the agricultural fraternity, is worried about the environmental, primarily soil-related, price this country is paying to stay with this "unquestioned technology". The manner in which the farmers of Punjab and Haryana have been ravaging their soils to extract from it the last grain of wheat or rice is the darkest period of the "first Green Revolution" and it would be a mistake if New Delhi attempts to replicate it elsewhere in the country, in the belief that India needs only to produce more. Produce more, we must, but not in the manner we did earlier.

"An ounce of soil is worth more than a kilogram of gold", thus goes a Vietnamese proverb. Our agricultural scientists and policy-makers are yet to understand its meaning. India can only shine when its farms do, not only when the Bombay Stock Exchange does.

(The author, a former National Science Foundation Professor, Royal Society, Belgium, can be contacted at nair_kpp @yahoo.com )