The debate going rounds nowadays is whether the Union Finance Minister's loan waiver scheme will permanently end the unabated suicides and bankruptcy of Indian farmers?
According to experts, the answer is a clear NO. "That is never a solution," said Mitul Shah of Neel Agrotech, an Ahmedabad based company engaged in developing and managing the whole supply chain for various agro and processed food products.
"Will the FM give another waiver next year, the year after that and each year? Well this is a very strange example of the shortsighted vision of our leaders. They think and live for today, never tomorrow," he added.
Shah's observation is supported by a majority of experts. They feel the real need is to help the agriculture sector and not the individual farmers.
"If you put this money in developing protected agricultural practices, drip irrigation facilities, creating aggregators for the farmers to play in the Futures market and teach them the modern farming methods, they will manage the rest," said Markand Patil, a Pune based farmer turned entrepreneur, who is now into contract farming of organic foods.
And if you put the money on a number of farmers, then another set of farmers will come up next year, he added.
Patil's turnaround came after he got a crash course while on his way from Pune to Mumbai on a train where he met an agent who was in search of an enterprising farmer who could produce the products that his clients have asked for in European countries.
Patil was in debt at that time and the agent promised to clear his debt and taught him how contract farming can give him better returns. But his land was not enough for the production that the agent wanted.
Patil joined hands with the landowner next to his land and started the business. Both partners now own a Toyota Corolla and a Honda Civic respectively and the agent is now permanently based in Paris from where he gives the orders.
"I think it is all about calculations. In my earlier days, I never calculated how much money I put in the field and how much I got from it. Year after year, debts increase and the farmers never come out of it," Patil said while on his way to Mumbai, where he plans to take a crash course in Futures trading and become an aggregator.
How does a farmer know which crop to produce to get the maximum out of his effort? Mitul Shah says it is not important what the farmers produce, more important is how they produce.
"For example, if you invest in protected farming, your yield increases four folds. The investment is one time but the yield is for years to come," he added.
But where will the farmers bring this investment? Shah lamented that the farmers do not get loans from the banks by mortgaging their agriculture land. The banks simply refuse even if the farmer has hundreds of acres of land.
He has no option but to approach the money lender or to mortgage his equipments and his home. But that will not fetch the kind of money he needs for farming. Ultimately, because of government's lackluster vision, the farmer ends up with the moneylender again and falls in a vicious circle, Shah said.
With land becoming a scarce commodity, the only way for a country to prevent food shortage is to substantially increase the crop/acreage of farming.
Neither the finance ministry nor the agricultural ministry is concerned about a long-term solution according to Jignesh Patel, a young and educated farmer in Ambiliyasan near Mehsana in Gujarat.
"I am not begging for your money. I am asking to help me in my agriculture by providing me money, technical know how and other networking platform so that I can increase my yield and get a better price for my product," he says.
According to him there are various agricultural research institutes that government runs and none of those institutes have helped any farmers anywhere in the country. There are numerous agricultural universities but still he finds it difficult to get any information from these universities.
"Now I have started surfing the Net and all the information I need I get within seconds. My question is why then do we need the government for if it cannot help us?" he asks.
