Doubling Farmers’ Income by 2022: Where do we stand?

 

Prof. (Dr.) M. K. Ghadoliya*

ABSTRACT

Many schemes have been launched to reduce farmers’ distress yet the conditions of farmers have not shown significant improvement. It is therefore necessary to assess the new slogan and scheme of the government to Double Farmers’ Income (DFI) by 2022. The Economic theory gives two distinct approaches of growth i.e. Balanced Growth Vs Unbalanced Growth. Our planners chose the second option and argued that agriculture is in very poor stage so it cannot be developed as leading sector of the economy. We gave much emphasis on basic and heavy industries sector arguing that once industrial sector develops it will benefit agriculture through it backward and forward linkages. The emphasis on agriculture in third five year plan was a necessity as we were at the starvation stage but even then terms of trade always remained against agriculture.

The present government has for the first time took a paradigm shift and focused on doubling farmers’ income and his welfare from agricultural growth. Agriculture contributes nearly 15% to GDP but provides employment to nearly 48 percent of Indian workforce. This indicates that agriculture is overcrowded perhaps this is the root cause of poverty, farmers’ distress and increasing farmers’ suicides. Some experts doubt the target of DFI and refer it as impossible and unrealistic. (Gulati 2016)

A holistic approach for the development of agriculture sector was therefore followed by introducing multiple reforms such as: improvement in crop productivity; improvement in livestock productivity; resource use efficiency or savings in the cost of production; increase in the cropping intensity; diversification towards high value crops; improvement in real prices received by farmers; and shift from farm to non-farm occupations". The paper makes an attempt to review the work done so far on these parameters so that if needed corrective action may be initiated in time.

Key Words:

Balance Growth; Unbalanced Growth; Backward and forward linkages;  productivity; input cost; investment; farmers’ welfare; Green Revolution; Soil health; cropping intensity; livestock productivity; diversification; non-farm occupation; micro irrigation, e-NAM; post- harvest infrastructure and value addition.

 

_____________________________________________

*Vice Chancellor           

Shri Khushal Das University,  Pilibanga, Hanumangarh (Raj.)

International Conference on “ Innovative Research on Science, Humanities, Engineering & Management (IC-IRSHEM-2020) jointly organised by Shri Khushal Das University, Pilibanga, Hanumangarh and Research Foundation of India on 15-16 Feb 2020.