Saturday, Apr 13, 2002
Saturday, Apr 13, 2002 |
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Andhra Pradesh
By Our Special Correspondent
Inaugurating the new academic building of the National Institute of Agricultural Extension Management (MANAGE), he shared the concern of the environmentalists but deplored the intense lobbying against use of biotechnology in the farm sector. Bt cotton seed is being welcomed by farmers in different parts of the country, he pointed out. The Minister called for reforms in various agricultural related activities like the extension, marketing and credit line to enable the Indian agriculture, ''which is in a transition phase'', to face the challenges of WTO. Mr. Ajit Singh was glad that agriculture was coming into its own after several decades with even the CII and FICCI talking about the farm sector. Indian agriculture suffered for want of lobbying and there was not a single representative of this sector in the official delegation of the country which signed the WTO agreement, he said. The Union Minister said the developed countries continued to pump in $ one billion per day. ''Our markets were opened up for them but their markets were not opened up. Yet we should learn to live with the WTO'', he said. He ridiculed the talk of imposing tax on agricultural incomes on the eve of every union budget. The advocates of tax on farm income were perhaps not aware of the limitations already existing in the form of land ceilings. In Uttar Pradesh, a farmer can own upto 12 acres under the ceiling act, which would yield Rs. 60,000 per annum at the rate of Rs. 5000 per acre. ''How can you tax such a low income. Only patwaris will get enriched by such measure'', he remarked. The Union Minister was also critical of the different layers of cooperative credit system which increased the interest rate from 8 per cent charged by NABARD to 15 to 16 per cent by the time it is delivered to the farmer. The institutional credit covered only 60 per cent of the farmers and the remaining were dependant on money lenders. One crop failure was leading to suicide deaths, a large number occurring in Andhra Pradesh, he said. The Minister, who launched the training scheme for agro-clinics and agro-business centres on the occasion, said farmers were willing to pay for the quality services rendered by the private extension operators. He hinted that the Government would come out with a subsidy element in the scheme of promoting agricultural clinics with bank finance so as to help the unemployed agricultural graduates. Talking to presspersons later, the Union Minister indicated that a host of new laws were contemplated to help farmers face the challenges arising out of the WTO regime. One piece of legislation to promote contract farming, which would not result in the farmer losing ownership of the land, was on the anvil. The contract farming would take care of the marketing and other problems of the farmers. MANAGE director general A.K.Goel explained the activities of MANAGE. There were brief presentations by successful agricultural entrepreneurs. Sudhir Kumar, Managing Director, Small Farmers' Agri-business Consortium (SFAC) , said about 10000 applications were received from agricultural graduates for setting up agri-business centres at different parts of the country. The training for these graduates is being organised at 60 centres.
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