Declain in Food Production in India

Subject: Impacts of National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (NREGA) - Decline in Food Crop Production – Emergency refinement required to balance the Food Production and Rural Employment…

Introduction:

The World Bank says that more than 30 per cent of the Indian population lives on less than $1 a day, but Indian economists believe that the figure of poor could be much more than the estimate. Successive governments tried various means to fight poverty with little success. The UPA government feels that the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act can solve that problem. They feel that this in one hand can reduce the poverty of rural and on another hand can reap the rich human resources available in rural India to develop the most essential infrastructural facilities and stop the migration of rural people to cities.

The National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, 2005 (NREGA) guarantees 100 days of employment in a financial year to any rural household whose adult members are willing to do unskilled manual work with minimum wage of Rs. 80 / day. The Act was initially extended in 200 districts, and gradually to other areas notified by the Central Government. It was planned to cover the whole country within five years. Also the government is now increasing the minimum wage of Rs/ 80 / day to Rs. 100 / day.

The NREGA is an important step towards realization of the right to work. It is expected to enhance people’s livelihood security on a sustained manner, by developing economic and social infrastructure in rural areas. The choice of works seeks to address the causes of chronic poverty such as drought, deforestation and soil erosion. One of the most distinguishing features of the NREGA is its approach towards empowering citizens to play an active role in the implementation of employment guarantee schemes, through gram sabhas, social audit, participatory planning and other activities.

What will it cost the nation’s common man?

There are lot of implementation issues and problems in the above NREGA scheme. There are lots of negative growths visible in the first phase of its implementation including in the farming sector. The effects of negative growth in the farming sector, reduces the food grains and essential commodities production drastically. This is already costing the nation heavily through steep rise in price of food grain and essential commodities, which is affecting the common man in their daily life.

Plight of Farming Sector:

Farming sector is the backbone of our nation and it provides nearly 70% of the nation’s employment. Still the negligence of the farming sector is repeated in the Indian History. Farming sector is witnessing a steep decline in productivity in the past years. Farming sector has the great potential for employment generation and poverty eradication. Any policies in India should be viewed from the perspective of Indian Farming sector and it should be ensured that the interest of farming community is protected. Though the farming community is providing full meals to all the citizens of the country, the country is not providing even half the meal to the farming community especially small, marginal and landless farmers are continuously struggling for household level food security.

Farming sector is regularly made scapegoat for the sake of overall development and one should not forget that country like India needs to grow farming sector for a sustainable development. When the sub-sectors of Agriculture like food processing, milk processing, fertilizer, pesticides, seeds, agriculture implements, tractor, diesel engines, Textiles, cold storage, and many more to say are growing at a faster phase, it raises many doubts about the deliberate negligence of the policy makers in the farming sector. Plight of Small, marginal & landless farmers are still worse, who contributes to 90% of the farming sector. They are the food bowl of India, who ensures the food security for the country and fails to secure his own food.

How will NREGA affect the Farming Sector?

Though the NREGA is targeted at unemployment and poverty eradication, the present form of the scheme is not designed from the perspective of the large Indian farming community. The farming community is affected due to the present form of NREGA in many ways like Unavailability of Farm Labours, Increased Labour Cost, Inefficient Work Culture, Reduced Food Crop Production and etc. It is just another patchwork policy, with just vote bank in mind and it does not address the core issues of the nation. Moreover it worsens the nation’s problems still further.

1. Unavailability of Farm Labours: The Farming communities are struggling to get rural manpower for Agricultural activities. Because most of the rural manpower are being utilized / booked in the NREGA for 100 days of employment and they get sufficient income for the rest of the year and they don’t need to work for the rest of days in the year. Moreover having access to lethargic working culture in government schemes, the farm labours show less interest in the agricultural hard works. Hence farming activities are reduced due to unavailability of farm labours and it will affect the agricultural production. Also due to shortage of farm labour, Farmers may prefer for commercial crops instead of Food crops, thus changing the crop patterns.

2. Increased Farm Labour Cost: Generally Farm labour cost in average is much less than the Rs. 80.00 / 100.00, which is provided in the NREGA scheme. After experiencing the higher cost of employment in the NREGA scheme, the farm labours demands the same range of labour cost for regular farming activity also. The increased Farm labour cost will increase the cost of cultivation and burden to the farmer also.

3. Inefficient utilization of Rural Manpower: In the NREGA scheme the rural manpower is being utilized in inefficient manner and in wasteful works. Most of the manpower is used for the works on Irrigation canal, water bodies, Flood control and etc. Generally the qualities of the works are very poor and most of the works are done just for name sake without any real purpose. The rural labours known for their hard working culture are being spoiled in the lethargic working cultures of government schemes. Once they are used for this lethargic work culture, they fail to deliver the required works in the agricultural fields and dictates the terms which is not suitable for the farming activities.

4. Small & marginal farmers turning down the Farming activity: Since the farming sector is already in deep trouble and viability of farming sector is already in doubts, now again with unavailability of labour & increased labour cost, the small & marginal farmers are switching over to other business or cash crops for their sustainability. Also in many cases they drop their farming activities and shift to urban area for employment opportunities or look for the employment in the NREGA schemes itself.

5. Reduced Food Crop Production: Due to unavailability of Labour, Increased Labour Cost & Inefficient utilization of Rural Manpower, the small & marginal farmers are turning down the regular farming activities and switching over cash crops instead of food crops or other source of income. Thus the farming sector changes the regular crop pattern and hence the food crop production is reduced.

Solution: Emergency refinement required to save the farming sector to balance the food crop production and rural employment…

India needs something more than just patchwork policies to help its millions of poverty stricken people from unemployment and poverty eradication. India should think beyond vote bank politics and should do something for the betterment of the country. As said earlier any major policies in India should be formulated in keeping Farming Sector in mind. That too for policies regarding employment generation & poverty eradication, we should not neglect the interest of the farming sector.

Refinement of NREGA scheme to save Farming sector: The present form of NREGA scheme seems to be formulated in negligence of farming sector. To protect the farming sector, the NRGEA should be modified in such a way it helps the farming sector for employment generation and food crop generation in sustainable manner.

1. Utilization of Manpower under NREGA scheme for Farm Works: 100 days of wage employment provided under the NREGA scheme shall be utilized for farm works with priority for food crop production. The NREGA scheme shall be modified to accommodate Farm Works with highest priority. Under this new proposal, the farmers irrespective of small or big shall register their Farm Labour requirements in the Gram Panchayat. Based on the seniority in registration, the Gram Panchayat shall provide the available manpower according to the farmer’s requirement on batches. i.e. if 20 farmers are registered and 100 labours are available, the panchayat can provide 10 labours each to the first 10 farmers on seniority basis and on the next day, they can split and provide the required manpower for the balance farmers. Thereby all the available manpower under the NREGA scheme shall be utilized in useful manner without compromising the interest of Farming Sector and in the same time fulfilling the objective of employment generation & poverty eradication.

2. Doubling the Employment Generation without increasing the funding: Under this new modification, the government shall double the employment opportunity with same amount of funds available for the scheme. By providing the required manpower to the farmers from the NREGA scheme, the government need not pay the full wage of Rs. 100 per day. The government may pay just 50% of the assured wages and the balance shall be availed from the Farmers. Thus the objective of government to provide employment with Rs. 100 a day is also fulfilled and at the same time the required manpower for the farming sector is also provided for the Farmers with just 50% of the wage. The Farmers are benefited with timely supply of manpower and on the other hand they are also benefited with reduced and subsidized wages.

3. Real Employment Generation & Poverty Eradication: The real employment generation and poverty eradication can be possible only through a policy which integrates the development of farming sector. As said earlier, the farming sector is providing almost 70% of employment in India and hence any real employment generation will be possible only through agricultural activities. Once the interest of farming sector is protected, it automatically enhances the food crop production and is the only source of poverty eradication. No any other means of poverty eradication is possible without food crop production.

We should never forget that the employment generation and poverty eradication are interrelated with the agricultural / food crop production. The present trend of farming sector shows some dangerous negative signs in food crop production. Due to the existing problems, the farmers are looking for the commercial cash crop farming activities instead of food crops which involves less manpower. With this negative growth in food crop production, the government may achieve the employment generation in short term, but in long run they will face shortages in food grains supply. Without ensuring the sufficient food grains supply, eradication of poverty is not a reality.

The negative effects of the NREGA schemes are already spreading its tentacles in a dangerous manner. It is already showing dangerous signs of negative growth in Agricultural sector. Government should realize and act immediately and refine the NREGA scheme to achieve its goal on employment generation & poverty eradication by integrating the farming activities with the present scheme. Government should balance the food crop production and employment generation and should never forget that Agriculture is the backbone of our country.