ISSUE DATE: April 26, 2021
UPDATED: April 17, 2021 14:27 IST
Procurement time, Wheat being loaded onto a truck at a mandi
in Amritsar during the Covid lockdown, May 2020
Faced with pressure from the Centre, Punjab is moving towards direct benefit transfer (DBT) to farmers for grain procured for the national granary this season. Fifteen other states that procure grain and other agricultural produce for central agencies, too, have started paying farmers directly or have agreed in principle to do so. This replaces the age-old system of paying farmers through ‘arthiyas’ or procurement agents.
Arthiyas facilitate trade in APMC (Agricultural Produce Marketing Committee) mandis for a fee. In Punjab, the total market charges for trade in agricultural produce is about 9.5 per cent of the crop value, including the 2.5 per cent commission paid to arthiyas. The state’s farmer unions, which are agitating against the new central farm laws, want the arthiya system to continue.
How Organic Farmers Have Shown the Way For Breaking Away From the Mandi, MSP System
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The stalemate between the Centre and the protesting farmers over the three farm reform laws Farmers Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Act, Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and Farm services Act, and the Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act is going on for over a month now, with no agreement in sight. The government has repeatedly assured farmers that the reforms will prove to be beneficial for them. However, the farmers fear that the new bills will erode the existing MSP (Minimum support price) system, make the government-controlled mandis (APMC) redundant, and more importantly, will allow private players to enter the market which will diminish their bargaining powers.
3838 The prolonged agitation against the contentious farm laws has prompted researchers, policy-makers and progressive farmers to focus on alternative models of agriculture which are environment-friendly. - iStock
Ruchika M Khanna
AS Punjab’s agriculture would largely become unviable if the Minimum Support Price-based model for wheat and paddy were to be eventually dispensed with as is now being feared the agrarian state desperately needs to look beyond these climatically unsustainable crops and cropping practices, and take its farming to the next level.
The prolonged agitation against the contentious farm laws has prompted researchers, policy-makers and progressive farmers to focus on alternative models of agriculture which are environment-friendly.
ISSUE DATE: December 21, 2020
UPDATED: December 11, 2020 20:38 IST
Brewing discontent, Farmers protesting at Delhi’s Singhu border
For much of his first term as prime minister, Narendra Modi seemed content with incremental reforms in agriculture. His critics charged him with using only an air rifle to target the changes needed. A year into his second stint, in the middle of a raging Covid-19 pandemic, Modi saw an opportunity in adversity to accelerate the reform process. This time, he pulled out a bazooka and fired a salvo of ordinances in June 2020, which he believed would bring about Farm Revolution 2.0. These included lifting restrictions binding farmers to sell their produce only in state-regulated mandis, easing the way for the corporate sector to engage in contract farming and knocking out the outdated Essential Commodities Act.