Doubling the Farm Incomes – Way forward

Suseelendra Desai, K.V. Rao, and K. Sammi Reddy

ICAR-Central Research Institute fro Dryland Agriculture
Santoshnagar, Hyderabad 500059
Abstract
Indian agriculture is going through a difficult phase leading to farm crisis. While on
one side the farm productivity is dwindling due to uncertain weather conditions, on
the other the produce does not get remunerative prices leading to distress sales. Small
and marginal farmers are unable to cope with the increasing input costs, non-
availability of farm labour, and unstable markets. In all, the farmer is pushed into debt
trap and thus ending up as a labour in urban areas. Under these circumstances,
scientifically designed concrete corrective steps are necessary to protect the farming
community, which needs overhauling of the entire system to remove hiccups, the
system currently facing.
To double the farm incomes, a multi-pronged approach is essential which should
revolve around developing affordable agricultural technologies, enabling policy
environment, market regulation and knowledge management. The Ten
Commandments that need to be addressed to double farm income are briefly
mentioned here. The first and foremost is that in a distress to earn more income and
tide over financial and labour crisis, farmers have started promoting unsustainable
farming systems par beyond the levels of available natural resources. This has
resulted in overexploitation of natural resources and thus destabilizing the resource
base. Hence, there is every need to revisit the ‘Natural-resource based farming
systems’, which could help to plan agro-ecologically suitable cropping systems and
allied enterprises. In this context, there is also a need to revisit agro-ecologies of India
especially with reference to soil and water and climatic resources. If required, based
on the natural resource base, altogether alternate farming enterprises such as fisheries,
livestock, poultry, piggery, feed and fodder-based enterprises etc also could be
promoted to realize maximum net returns. The second is market regulation systems
and suitable policy backstopping to ensure that the farmers get their due profits.
Often, the supply-demand chain is distorted due to vested interests and surplus
produce due to bountiful yields fail to get converted into extra profits. The third is
optimized management of agricultural residues to improve soil carbon status, which
will correct several associated maladies. Other than economic produce, care must be
taken to incorporate all other biomass into the soil itself. The fourth is that of climatic
variability and climate change issues which are impacting Indian agriculture and
hence need to be addressed to bring in resilience in the farming systems. One of the
approaches could be to promote integrated farming systems (IFS) modules which will
not only help to sustain farm income from one enterprise or the other but also
maintain a balance on use of natural resources. The fifth is appropriate and efficient
knowledge management systems to develop and disseminate in time the requisite
farm knowledge to the farmers to ensure optimized farm harvests and establishment
of professional extension services. Educating the farmers and luring the rural youth
towards agriculture, primary value addition to farm produces through FPOs, small
farm holder consortia, promoting mahila kisans and similar such confederacies for
enhanced benefits. The sixth is establishment of extensive storage systems, well-
greased farm-market systems and ancillary processing industries in clusters of
production regions to ensure stable farm produce prices. The seventh is to strengthen
R&D environment with a mandate to develop adaptable technologies including robust
seed supply management chains for diverse agricultural scenarios coupled with strong
backstopping by basic researches by embracing and internalizing scientific advances
in other fields. The eighth is that of misuse and abuse of several chemicals leading to
soil, air and water pollution and thereby disturbing ecological balance. This is also
leading to residues in final produce and thereby attracting non-tariff trade barriers and
thus rejection of consignments. The ninth is maintenance and management of
agrobiodiversity to address future challenges and opportunities. The last but not the
least and the tenth is development and operationalization of functional farm insurance
products as a relief measure in case of unforeseen eventualities.
Thus, to double farm income, there is a need to address the issue from several angles
so that the system becomes viable and sustainable over the generations. Further, with
the evolution of time, the models also need to be tweaked to meet the future needs.