Farm panel for keeping seed cover

The parliamentary standing committee on agriculture has asked the agriculture ministry to abandon the move to discontinue the seed insurance scheme being implemented through the General Insurance Corporation of India (GIC).

It has, at the same time, assailed the GIC for its dilatory claim settlement procedure, which is responsible for the failure of the scheme.

The panel has also observed that the National Council for Applied Economic Research (NCAER), which was assigned to evaluate the scheme, has failed to submit any report.

It has, therefore, asked the ministry to tell NCAER to submit the report within a month.

Any decision on the fate of the seed insurance scheme should be taken only after studying the report, the committee has said in its first report presented in parliament in the last session.

The seed insurance scheme was launched in 1999-2000 in 10 states on a pilot basis to provide financial security and income stability to the producers of breeder seed.

The objective was to encourage the farmers to multiply the seeds of newly evolved crop varieties and hybrids by covering their risk against the failure of the seed crops.

It covered crops like wheat, rice, groundnut, sunflower, soyabean, arhar, gram, cotton and coarse cereals like bajra and maize.

However, the scheme has not become popular with seed growers due to delay and other problems in getting the claims settled. The agriculture ministry has consequently proposed to drop the scheme on the advice of the Planning Commission.

Disapproving the ministry's move, the parliamentary committee said in its report: "The scheme is one of the rarest methods by which the seed production can be encouraged all over the country and risk in sowing such new variety of seeds can be covered and adequate protection given to the farmers." It would be difficult to encourage private growers to take up seed production without giving them protection under this scheme.

The committee took strong objection to the GIC's tardy claim settlement procedure resulting in the scheme's unpopularity with the farmers.

It said that this was purely an administrative matter which could be amicably resolved to ensure speedy claim settlement. It asked the ministry to inform it of the action taken by the GIC in reforming this procedure.

The panel also set one-month deadline for the NCAER to finish the evaluation study of the scheme and submit its report.