Corporate farming norms to be made more acceptable and balanced for both farmers and corporates
Key challenges
Small landholding: Since the bulk of farmers have less than 2 hectares of land, there is a difficulty in getting the benefits of ‘economics of scale’.
Limited access to technology and extension: Farmers still do not have access to better technology.
Also, effective dissemination of information from lab to land remains a challenge.
Storage: We need to come a long way in terms of availability and access of agricultural storage facilities for farmers.
Price volatility: The agri sector faces the Cobweb phenomenon, so there always exists a need to ensure farmers get remunerative prices.
Market integration: Farmers need to be better connected to the end-consumer. The number of stakeholders across the value chain needs to be reduced.
Industry ask
- Better environment for start-ups in food and agri business
- Greater technological investments in the field of agriculture
- Simplified leasing norms for setting up processing infrastructure
- Corporate farming norms to be made more acceptable and balanced for both farmers and corporates; buying and selling outside APMCs
- Increased involvement of private players for increasing storage infrastructure
- eNam should be implemented seamlessly over all markets and commodities
- Better mechanism for price stabilisation of agri commodities
PwC point of view
Ajay Kakra, director (Agri & Natural Resources), PwC India
- Investment in irrigation, farmer producer organisation, insurance and market integration, besides other sector reforms, need to continue
- Further investment interest from the private sector is needed in backward integration, processing infrastructure and technology initiative
Industry voice
Siraj Chaudhry, chairman, Cargill India
- Significant focus is needed on agriculture, with a view to improving rural economy and livelihoods
- Policies and allocations are needed to ensure good prices for farmers’ crops, food and nutritional security and minimum wastage
- Risks will need to be reduced via better implementation and monitoring of risk-mitigating policies
Read all about Jaitley's final full Budget right here!
Photograph: Amit Dave/Reuters
