Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday held a meeting to deliberate on the issues being faced by Indian agricultural sector and the reforms required in a wide range of fields such as agriculture marketing, management of marketable surplus, access of farmers to institutional credit and freeing the farm sector from various restrictions with appropriate backing of the statute.

He stressed upon the need for making strategic interventions in the existing marketing eco-system and bringing appropriate reforms in the context of rapid agricultural development. The meeting also deliberated on ways to making concessional credit flow possible to strengthen agriculture infrastructure, special Kisan Credit Card saturation drive for PM-Kisan beneficiaries and facilitating inter and intra-state trade of agriculture produces to ensure the fairest return to farmers. Developing e-NAM into a platform of platforms to enable e-commerce was also a topic of discussion. Apart from Home Minister Amit Shah, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar and senior Agriculture Ministry officials participated in the meeting

The meeting also discussed the possibilities of having a uniform statutory framework in the country to facilitate new ways for farming which will infuse capital and technology in an agrarian economy. The pros and cons of biotechnological developments in crops or enhancement of productivity and reduction in input costs came up for discussion at the meeting. The participated suggested that there is a need to make the Essential Commodities Act compatible with present times. This will help incentivise large-scale private investment in post-production agriculture infrastructure and also will have a positive effect on commodity derivative markets.

Developing Brand India, creation of commodity-specific boards or councils and promotion of agri-clusters and contract farming are some of the interventions that were deliberated to boost Agriculture commodity export.

The PM called for the dissemination of technology till the last mile and for making Indian farmers more competitive in the global value chain The use of technology in the agriculture sector is of paramount importance as it has the potential to unlock the entire value chain for the benefit of the farmers.

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