Farm debt crisis: 70% of agricultural families spend more than they earn

Farm loan waiver not the solution; indebtedness a symptom and not the root cause of farm crisis

Nearly 70% of India’s 90 million agricultural households spend more than they earn on average each month, pushing them towards debt, which is now the primary reason in more than half of all suicides by farmers nationwide, according to an IndiaSpend analysis of various government data.

The failing economics of such farms–agricultural households in the south are most indebted–are exacerbated by additional loans that families take to meet health issues, leaving them with diminished ability to invest in farming. Outstanding loans for health reasons doubled over a decade to 2012, and loans