Farmers Movement Archive

Secondary agriculture unlikely to ‘double’ farmer income in Karnataka

Bengaluru: The setting up of a secondary agriculture department in Karnataka to help value addition to agricultural produce as a means to increasing--or doubling--farmer income is part of an additional “bureaucratic process” that will be of little consequence to the sector, experts say.The idea stems from the possibility of adding value to farmer-grown produce, which would help increase revenues, but overlooks the systemic challenges the sector and its practitioners face, they say.“This (secondary agriculture department) will definitely not help as they (government) could not find solutions to existing problems,” Dr Prakash Kammardi, a farm expert and former chairman of the Karnataka Agricultural Prices Commission (KAPC), said.According to the Basavaraj Bommai-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government in Karnataka, the decision to set up the department “is the means to taking agriculture forward and achieving the goal of doubling of farmer’s income.”The setting up of the department is an extension of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ambitious proposal to double farmer’s income by 2022 in the country where most of them have been reeling under piling losses and surviving from one calamity to the other.The forced withdrawal of the contentious farm laws by the union government, people aware of the developments said, is likely to have contributed to the setting up of the secondary agriculture thought process as a way to help big industries.“Since all the three acts (farm laws) were withdrawn, it is possible that they (governments) are looking at it differently and this (secondary agriculture) could be in disguise to help the corporate sector or anyone other than the genuine farmers,” Kammardi said.The proposal comes at a time when farmers across the country have been at the receiving end of market and monsoon vagaries, adding to existing problems that stem from growing pressure on land, small holdings, piling losses, fluctuation of prices, which were exacerbated by the Covid-19 pandemic as well other several other factors.Between October 1 and November 21, the state received 307 mm of rainfall as against a normal of 166 mm during the same period, according to data by the Karnataka State Disaster Management Authority (KSDMA). The state witnessed excess rains of over 85% on average with 23 out of 31 districts recording excess to large excess rainfall.Statewide, there has been a departure of 271% more rains in November as Karnataka recorded an average of 129 mm as against a normal of 35mm.This has damaged crops in lakhs of hectares of agricultural and horticultural lands, compensation for which is yet to reach farmers or has been simply inadequate to make up for the losses, adding to the growing agrarian crisis in the southern state.“It is already 2022, the only thing that has doubled is farmer’s deaths, not their income,” Kurubur Shanthakumar, a farmer activist said.Karnataka has defined the scope of secondary agriculture as those which use raw material, the primary product and by-products of agriculture and other biological resources available locally in its rural agrarian neighbourhood and which deploys locally available skills or a high level of rural manpower to manage the production of goods and services.The intent of the proposal also is to promote farm, cottage and village-level rural industries by utilising low intensity of capital and technology.“Secondary agriculture includes food and non-food bio-resource based products for human and industrial use,” according to the Karnataka government.Bommai on Wednesday, in a two-part post on twitter, said; “In response to the call for doubling farmers’ income, given by Hon’ble PM @narendramodi ji, Govt of Karnataka has set up Directorate of Secondary Agriculture. This new body will work towards popularising Integrated Farming System(IFS) in each agro-climatic zone by providing better markets and market intelligence.”People aware of the developments said that while the doubling of farm income itself is in doubt as there is no measure to quantify what a farmer earns currently as the largest chunk of people in the sector own less than an acre.“Doubling (incomes) etc, these are all slogans. Now no one talks about doubling anymore,” Siraj Hussain, a farm expert and retired civil servant said.However, he said; “If higher value farmers can produce crops or horticulture or produce that can be sold at a higher value, obviously they will earn more if there is not much fluctuation of prices.”Kammardi said that a farmer with less than one acre is forced to work as agricultural labourer in another place; with MNREGA wage or financial support from other earning members in the family, they run a small shop or any other means to get money which cannot be classified as income earned from farming.

Hindustan Times

21-01-2022

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