Agrarian distress is an ever continuing challenge for any Government in Centre or states of India. From land reforms to crop insurance, APMC act to eNAM, Green revolution to transgenic crops the changes in agriculture has done little to uplift the status of Indian farmers. Suicides and food inflation are ever daunting the agriculture sector of country. Present Government lead by Narendra Modi is also continuing in efforts of addressing farmers distress with the vision of doubling farmers income in five years. This write up overlooks the initiatives taken by the government recent past in the Agricultural sector.
Soil is wealth
Soil Health Card (SHC) scheme was launched on a massive scale on 19 February 2015 to increase Fertilizer Use Efficiency. Two cycle of SHC was covering 14.20 lakhs cards up to March 2018. Mobile apps were launched to monitor the progress. Funds were provided to strengthen the existing soil labs and establishment of new lab.
Promoting Organic farming
Paramparagat Kirshi Vikas Yojana is first of it’s kind scheme to promote organic farming. The scheme promotes sustainability in use of farm resources, promotes Cluster formation for production of organic inputs and also assistance to the members of cluster with Rs. 50, 000 per hectare for 3 years period. So far ten thousand cluster has been approved and Rs. 947 Crore has been spend between 2014-2018 for the promotion of Organic farming.
Market anywhere in India
National Agricultural Market (e-NAM) is the digital platform ensuring the farmers to sell throughout country by utilizing the existing APMC system. An exclusive portal is developed for virtual transactions. It functions multilingually in 6 languages viz., English , Hindi, Tamil, Guajarati, Marathi, Telugu and Odia. e-NAM is also been designed to function in mobile application. The scheme was launched on 1st July 2015.
Insure to Ensure Income
Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima yojna replaced all other existing agricultural insurance schemes. It focused on covering all type of losses in crops from sowing to post harvest. Trusted on technology like drones, remote sensing as a tool for accurate estimation of losses.
Per drop more crop
Pradhan Mantra Krishi Sinchayee Yojana (PMKSY) replaced all other previously existed micro irrigation scheme with an comprehensive objective. The scheme focus on two aspects, one to encourage and adopt micro irrigation system like sprinkler and drip irrigation and the second objective was increasing water availability. 99 small and medium projects was taken up under this project with a capacity of 76.03 lakh hectare out of which 18 schemes are completed on March 2018 others schemes are under progress .
And many other initiatives like Indian Forrest Act (amendment) 2018 that brings Bamboos under non forest areas as grass to encourage the Bamboo cultivation, Model Agriculture Land Leasing Act 2018 that assures the better legal pavement for leasing out land and ensuring the finance to the lease holder and Model Contract Farming Act 2018 that provides safeguards to both parties of contract are few such legal initiatives to address farming sector. The success of doubling farmers income depends on effective implementation of schemes and initiatives by Government.
Compiled by, Janarthan R
Post graduate scholar – Agricultural Extension & Communication.
