Tamil Nadu opposes Centre's Crop Income Insurance Scheme

The Tamil Nadu government today opposed the Centre's proposed new National Crop Income Insurance Scheme (NCIIS), saying it will not benefit farmers in vulnerable and disaster-prone areas.
At the same time, some states like Haryana and Uttarkhand want to come up with their own schemes as per needs.
These states made their views clear in a consultation meeting with Union Agriculture Minister Radha Mohan Singh on the draft NCIIS which aims to protect farmers against both yield loss and price fluctuations.
In the meeting, Tamil Nadu Agriculture Minister S S Krishnamurthy said: "The proposed new scheme NCIIS should not be implemented as it adversely affects farmers."

The new scheme has old features as the premium proposed is calculated on actuarial basis and due to which the "vulnerable and disaster prone area needing the insurance most will have the least quantum of insurance," he said.
The high insurance premium rates apart from increasing the financial burden on farmer raises manifold the subsidy component of premium to be borne by the state, he added.

Krishnamurthy further said the claim process would be "cumbersome" without adequate mechanism to capture price fluctuation and manpower to calculate crop yield.
The state is implementing National Agricultural Insurance Scheme (NAIS) for the 2014-15 crop year and it should be allowed to continue with this scheme in future, he added.

Besides Tamil Nadu, agriculture ministers from Uttarakhand, Haryana and Gujarat and other state representatives were present at the meeting.
Briefing media on the issue, Union Agriculture Minister Radha Mohan Singh said that 20-odd states have given their suggestions on the proposed scheme and some states like Haryana and Uttarakhand have said that they would like to launch their own schemes.
"We have decided to allow state governments to come up with their own schemes depending upon their needs. In that case, the new NCIIS would not be implemented by those states," he said.
To fast-track implementation of the NCIIS, the Minister said that a committee would be set up to vet suggestions made by states and stakeholders.

Singh said the new crop income insurance scheme would be launched on a pilot basis next fiscal.
Agriculture Secretary Ashish Bahuguna said the existing crop insurance scheme gives compensation for loss of crop yields only. But the new scheme aims to compensate farmers both from loss of yields and price fluctuations.
The Centre is implementing various farm insurance schemes since 1985 to insulate farmers against agri-risks.
An all-risk Comprehensive Crop Insurance Scheme (CCIS) was introduced in 1985, which was replaced with National Agricultural Insurance Scheme (NAIS) with effect from 1990 followed by National Crop Insurance Programme (NCIP) in 2013-14 with the components of Modified National Agricultural Insurance Scheme (NAIS) and Weather-based Crop Insurance scheem.