Farming by committee

Agriculture has become a drag on the economy. While most sectors are looking up, agricultural growth has steadily decelerated, averaging less than the population growth rate for nearly a decade now.

The annual growth rate in agricultural GDP, which peaked at 3.5 per cent in the 1980s, has plummeted to about 1 per cent in the first three years of the tenth plan (2002-07). No wonder then that the mid-term appraisal of the plan chose to draw pointed attention to the plight of the farm sector, holding it as the chief cause of distress in the rural areas and therefore leading to suicides by farmers.

This subject also dominated the meeting of the National Development Council (NDC) in June, as well as the meeting of the full Planning Commission last week.

Interestingly, the mid-term appraisal of the plan, as also the presentations made in subsequent meetings, have clearly outlined the problems plaguing agriculture and the solutions that can spur its revival.

What these high-level parleys, attended among others by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and state chief ministers, has resulted in is the appointment of yet another committee headed by the agriculture minister, Sharad Pawar.

What is intriguing is that even this new committee's verdict will not lead to quick remedial action. It will merely form the basis for measures that the Planning Commission will moot for the 11th plan, which is still two years in the future. If this is not bad enough, the Pawar committee in its wisdom has decided in its first meeting last week to carry the process of committee formation further, and set up six sub-committees to go into different issues.

All this, after the Planning Commission and the agriculture ministry have already outlined the problems as well as the solutions.

A troubled sector supporting 60 per cent of the country's population needs more action than the formation of committees. What should, and surely can, be done to put agriculture on the revival path is to expand irrigation, induct technology for enhancing the productivity of rain-fed areas constituting 60 per cent of total farm land, and speed up marketing reforms to ensure adequate returns to farmers.

Nearly 20 million hectares of additional land can be irrigated merely by completing pending major and medium irrigation projects and tapping the unutilised potential of existing projects through command area development. This would also add to hydel power generation, further boosting economic growth.

Much of the technology needed for boosting dry-land productivity is available in the country's research institutes. It needs to be made accessible to farmers, who will need credit support to put it to gainful use. The most critical factor in all this is investment. Unfortunately, the states are devoting no more than 5 per cent of their total plan outlays to agriculture.

The picture is even more dismal in the case of Central numbers. Action on this front has to be taken by the Planning Commission and by the government. The resources allocated for rural development, Bharat Nirman and the national employment guarantee programme can surely be put to effective use in this context.