Given
the compulsions of feeding the growing population and maintaining food security,
agriculture has unmistakably occupied a pivotal position on the radar screen of
our policy makers, planners and administrators. However, it is also a stark fact
that, in reality, it has received very little attention. The government's direct
intervention in improving the facilities is hardly evidentbe it investment in
the agriculture sector, availability of credit, transfer of technology to the
farmers, building rural infrastructure, availability of agricultural inputs, providing
crop insurance cover, etc.
The
private sector has also not shown much interest in promoting the agricultural
sector despite the fact that nearly two-thirds of the Indian population draws
its livelihood from agriculture. The reason for this is because of the huge infrastructure
bottlenecks on the one hand and regulatory constraints on the other. Due to this
negligence for decades, we have not been able to ensure a reasonable standard
of living for the farming population. There was a desperate need for reforms in
agriculture, but unfortunately, the economic reform process launched in the early
1990s seems to have completely bypassed this vital sector.
The
reforms have mostly benefitted the economic industry and the service sector, which
pulled up the GDP growth rates to 6-6.5% per annum in the second half of the 1990s
and 7.5-8% in recent years. On the other hand, growth in agriculture has been
hovering in the range of 1.5-2% per annum. For the period 2005-07, the government
is aiming to achieve a GDP growth of 8% per annum and is committed to maintain
thisor perhaps even achieve higher levelsduring the Eleventh Plan Period. To achieve
this, agricultural growth will have to increase by 4% per annum. And that would
mean a fundamental transformation in the way agricultural activity is currently
conducted in India. Needless to say, this transformation has to be brought about
in a very short time frame. |
