Promoting agriculture

By Gilbert Etienne

THE REPORT of the National Agriculture Policy is most welcome because it is high time to remind many Indians that their country remains mostly rural; that agriculture still accounts for nearly 30 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and employs 55 to 60 per cent of the active population. The report is comprehensive and very balanced, but it does not convey a sense of urgency. In order to achieve a 4 per cent growth, one needs radical and most drastic changes involving enormous amounts of public funds.

In spite of good to fair weather since 1988, agricultural growth has decelerated. One day, bad monsoons will return with serious effects. Public funds devoted to agriculture, irrigation, rural roads, rural electricity have declined both for operations and maintenance (O&M) expenditures and for new investments. Besides, out of the meagre amounts allotted for recurrent expenditures, part is lost in malpractices, leakages, corruption.

Irrigation has been and will remain the main engine of agricultural growth. Now the condition of canals has deteriorated so much that only 38 to 40 per cent of the water entering the system reaches the crops, while a normal rate of efficiency should be around 60 per cent.

Tubewells which have been so important in the Green Revolution from Punjab to Uttar Pradesh face lots of troubles. Electricity, after boosting the adoption of tubewells, is hindering further progress because of its erratic supply.

Under favourable conditions, in Uttar Pradesh power is available eight hours a day, but breakdowns, power cuts, falling voltage are common for days and even weeks on end. In Bihar, there is hardly any electricity, O&M of networks is increasingly poor, aging material is tardily replaced. (In Bulandshahr district of Uttar Pradesh, for instance, some transformers were introduced in 1935). Pilfering of electricity and theft of wire go on along with other malpractices.

In the first phase of the Green Revolution, substantial progress was possible with a little irrigation, because yields were quite low to begin with. Today, in the advanced districts farmers harvest 3000 to 3500 kilogrammes per hectare of wheat or clean rice.

A further increase up to 4000-5000 kg/ha, which is closer to the yields achieved in Western Europe for wheat and for rice in Japan, would require a system as efficient as in those countries - i.e. good and timely supply of water, timely renewal of seeds, proper balance of NPK fertilizers, continuous and growing research.

Now, on all these scores, the situation is far from satisfactory, which explains why foodgrains and other major crops' yields tend to level off. In order to avoid degeneration, high-yield varieties of seeds must be renewed every 4-5 years, which is far from being the case. The imbalance of fertilizers with underuse of phosphate and potash leads, in the long run, to soil deterioration. As agriculture is becoming more sophisticated it requires also better extension services and more basic research. As to rainfed crops, they are also not progressing much, except oilseeds which have replaced coarse grain in some areas.

No doubt one comes across more dynamic trends in animal husbandry, eggs, milk, vegetables, fruit, even flowers, but such trends cannot counterbalance the weakness of major crops.

Even additional yields in Green Revolution districts will not be able to meet the growing population's needs. Now, the future granaries of India lie in the eastern plains, which in Bihar and Bengal had been for thousands of years the granaries of northern India until they were replaced by canal-irrigated tracts in Punjab and the Jamuna-Ganga doab.

In the East, the growth potential is enormous, with fine alluvial soil, plenty of ground and surface water and complemented by normally generous monsoons. Today, the irrigated crop, including in Assam and Orissa, amounts to just 27-40 per cent of the cultivated area.

This is one of the reasons why growth has been sluggish except in recent times in West Bengal, although the extent of reported progress seems questionable when looking at the mediocre record of irrigation: 25 per cent of the paddy fields in 1984/85 and just 27.2 per cent by 1995-96.

A massive Green Revolution, beyond the present pockets, would also have a tremendous social impact, enabling farmers holding 0.5 to 1 hectare to enjoy a surplus of grain for sale. As observed in the present Green Revolution villages, real wages of landless labourers grow in real terms and there are more job opportunities.

During repeated surveys of the same districts from the beginning of the Green Revolution (1965-70) until the late 1990s, I noticed that wages for the same work were in the advanced districts double (or more in the case of Punjab) the amount in slow-moving areas. Besides, the overall process of growth stimulated by the Green Revolution in the former widens the labour market in agriculture, animal husbandry, transport, petty trade, small industries, construction of pucca houses.

In the same areas, more flood control works are needed as well as proper drainage of vast tracts of land with excess water even under normal rains. Prospects in areas suffering from low and erratic monsoon, lacking ground water are not very good at present.

Much more vigorous efforts are required to promote watershed development, but achievements are bound to be confined to a single crop a year, with yields rarely beyond 1,000 kg/ha of coarse grain, as against 200-800 kg/ha at present depending on the amount of rain.

The whole process is complex. For instance, in Maharashtra which enjoys a good rural administration it took more than five years to systematically survey all the areas fit for watershed development.

Finally, district administrations and irrigation departments need to be strengthened and at least partly purged of their shortcomings. In that perspective it might be more appropriate to rely more on smart and able IAS officers than on panchayati raj. Not unfrequently, I have come across such men in my surveys who contributed to better development provided they were not too much hindered by local netas or too frequently transferred.

All these tasks involve enormous public expenditure because, no matter the rightist dogmas, the market cannot cope with everything. It needs also a thorough commitment from the elites in New Delhi.

What is disturbing is that all these issues have been amply analysed and made known for years by a number of Indian experts, such as Mr. Y. K. Alagh, Mr. C. R. Hanumantha Rao, Mr. A. Gulati, Mr. K. Prasad. For instance, the S. R. Sen Report on Eastern India (Reserve Bank) was released as early as in 1984 without much followup even today.

(The writer is Professor Emeritus, Institutes of International Studies and Development Studies, Geneva.)

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