Hyderabad: At a time when the number of farmers giving up farming in the absence of assured and consistent income, is increasing, the government which has the responsibility to give assurance to farmers, is giving hopes with welfare schemes instead, but not initiating integrated farming reforms.
The Central government is maintaining that the recently introduced bills in Lok Sabha would benefit the farmers a lot. The attitude of the government to support corporate power houses without understanding the ground realities and putting a stop on the difficulties of the farmers, is angering the farmer unions.
The Union government brought three bills in the Parliament to give the ordinances issued in June a legal sanction purportedly for the welfare of the farmers.
The first Bill promises freedom for the farmer to sell his crop anywhere in the country, the second promises legal status for the advance agreements of the farmers made with the traders, and the third promises removing restrictions on stocking of essential commodities such as pulses and oil seeds.
The First Bill
The government keeps saying that the farmers will have the freedom to sell their produce anywhere in the country. Ironically however, the question is whether the small time farmers (86%) who sadly sell their crop in the reaping point itself to clear off their debts, will be in a position to take their produce to other states to sell?
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The traders form a syndicate among themselves and hamper the interest of the farmers by not allowing proper rates. Will the machinery, which is not taking any action even in the controlled market, control the private traders in the country? We have been witnessing this kind of exploitation in Telangana's cotton markets. We have witnessed the agitations of the farmers on the inability of marketing officers to control the traders and ultimately achieving support prices by exerting pressure on the rulers.
If the farmers are given the freedom to sell their produce anywhere without paying any market fee, yards will be closed in the absence of income. Also in the name of free trade, people sell goods in the garb of farmers.
Finally, it is very evident from the government's actions that the persons who would ultimately benefit, are the traders. This year, while Rabi Maize was expected to fetch a price of Rs 2,000 per quintal, it has not been getting even Rs 1,300. At this stage, if the state and central governments tell the farmers to sell them anywhere in the country instead of buying it themselves by paying higher price, will that be of help to the farmers?
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Even if the farmers make effort to sell their crop elsewhere for getting a higher price, will a small farmer, who has one or two acres of land, travel that far and manage the trickeries of the market? Surely the government is aware of these facts.
The Second Bill
If we scrutinize the second bill, the government was in a pitiable situation when some seeds bought from the companies proved to be of inferior quality. The agreements that will be made with the farmers, where they issue some types of seeds to the farmers to do farming with an assurance that they would buy the crop, also come under this Bill.
In the past, some companies made the farmers believe that they would make a profit in lakhs when they cultivate medicinal plants like Mangium, Jafra, teak plants, Aloevera, Doolagondi, Rama roja, Safed musli etc. After selling seeds, the companies disappeared and the government has not been able to do anything in this regard.
Farmers say that if agreements with the firms are given a legal status, we can check cheating by the companies. But this indirectly leads to 'agreement agriculture'. The fear is that if agreement agriculture is extended in the country and agriculture goes into the hands of corporate bodies, poor farmers will have to turn coolies.
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The biggest drawback in the bill is that the Agriculture department has no responsibility for the agreements that the farmers enter into with the traders and the companies. Notable are the legal cases that Pepsi has filed against potato farmers in Gujarat.
The Third Bill
The third Bill is regarding the amendment to stocking of essential commodities. The main intention of the Essential Commodities Act except in the time of war or some such crisis, is that there won't be any restrictions on the stocking of items such as oil seeds, fruits, vegetables, pulses, millets.
However, by stocking them heavily, it would be beneficial to agricultural business firms rather than the farmers. The agricultural and food processing companies will take advantage of the poor farmers who sell them in the farm reaping sites itself. This bill gives them scope to buy the produce from the farmers and stock heavily. They buy the produce from the farmers when the prices are low and stock them in huge quantities and sell when the rates are high. The new Bills give them a sort of unbridled freedom. It is very clear that retail marketing agencies will benefit from this provision.
The government itself should buy from the farmers
To achieve the target of doubling the income of the farmers, the measures taken up by the Union Government are in no way useful. It is a harsh reality that they will increase the income of businessmen and Corporate bodies by ten times. If one really wants to help the farmers, giving them profitable support price is enough.
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If it earnestly wishes to benefit the farmers, the government should implement the Dr Swaminathan recommendations that in addition to production cost, the farmers should be paid 50 per cent additionally. The minimum support price should also be extended, not just for the 22 types, but to all the crops that are grown in the country. If lesser price is registered, the government should interfere and ensure that the farmers are not put to loss.
Agricultural produce should be bought by the government or should be entrusted to Mahila Societies. The government should play the role of middle man while making agreements for food processing of several crops. Food processing sector should be extended in such a way that it would be beneficial to the farmers and they receive consistent income.
Instead of taking up such measures which would help the farmers stand on their own feet, the decisions to help businessmen and industrialists would tantamount to surrendering the farmers' hardship to them. At the same time, for the sake of votes, if they introduce schemes like PM Kisan, it would be nothing but cheating the farmers and cheating themselves.
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