New Delhi: Rajya Sabha Member of Congress and member of Standing Committee of Agriculture in Parliament Pratap Singh Bajwa has written a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chairman of Finance Commission NK Sharma on the high level expert group on agricultural exports constituted by 15th finance commission.
Raising the questions over the exclusion of state governments and diverse voices, Member of Parliament Pratap Singh Bajwa has requested to expand the committee and include a sitting member from Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha from a state where agriculture is major economic activity.
The high-level expert group on Agricultural Exports constituted by the Finance Commission in February 2020 has to work on understanding the critical gaps in agriculture sectors and to assess import and export substitution opportunities for Indian Agricultural Products.
This expert group has also to recommend strategies and measures to increase farm productivity and enable higher value addition, waste reduction and strengthen logistics infrastructure to improve global competitiveness.
The eight member committee has private conglomerates, former Agriculture Secretary, Ministry of food processing representative, Chairman of Agricultural and Processed food export Development Authority as members. The committee does not have any farmer group or State Government representative or anyone which is most affected by these recommendations.
He has also recommended to include two members from farmer unions to represent views of farmer community and two members from cooperative to describe status of agri export sector.
Member parliament has requested PM to expand committee from eight to fourteen members that consists of variety of stakeholders to ensure more inclusive discussion.
Pratap Singh Bajwa has also raised question on exclusion of successful Dairy Cooperative like Mother Dairy, Amul, Verka from the committee and exclusion of state governments where agriculture is major economic activity.
He also referred to seventh schedule of Indian constitution which mentions agriculture as state subject and any expert group discussing agricultural policy must include representatives from state government that will be most affected by recommendations.
Punjab politicians have opposed some of policies of Union Government on Agriculture sector. All major political parties of Punjab on Wednesday resolved to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Agriculture Minister on the issue of farm ordinances.
Shiromani Akali Dal and Aam Aadmi Party has extended Full support to Chief Minister Captain Amrinder Singh on the issue of the "Anti Farmer Ordinances" passed by centre and to appeal union government to immediately withdraw them in public interest and not to tinker with MSP regime.
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