A promise on paper

MSPs mean nothing without a procurement system

Even three weeks after the government announced a “historic” hike in the minimum support prices (MSPs) of kharif crops to pitch them at 50 per cent above the paid-out production costs, the new prices remain only on paper for want of any bid to enforce them. The market seems to have cold-shouldered the government’s avowedly pro-farmer move with hardly any noticeable movement in prices. The inflationary tendency that normally used to ensue from MSP spikes in the past has largely been missing this time. Reported data from key agricultural mandis indicates that 12 of the 14 commodities, whose prices have