The Hindu : National : Farmers’ policy tabled

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Saturday, Nov 24, 2007
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Farmers’ policy tabled

Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI: The government on Friday laid in the Rajya Sabha a National Policy for Farmers, based on the recommendation of the National Commission on Farmers that was headed by eminent agricultural scientist M.S. Swaminathan.

The policy, approved by the Cabinet, will be tabled in Lok Sabha next week.

“The primary focus of this policy is on ‘farmer’ defined holistically and not merely on agriculture. In that sense, it is much more comprehensive than an agriculture policy. The objective is to improve the economic viability of farming by substantially improving the farmers’ net income,” Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar has said in the report.

The major goals listed in the policy are: improving the economic viability of farming by substantially increasing the new income of farmers, protecting and improving land, water, bio-diversity and genetic resources, developing support services, including provision of seeds, irrigation, power, machinery and implements, fertilizers and credit at affordable prices.

The policy sought strengthening of the bio-security of crops, providing appropriate price and trade policy mechanisms to enhance farmers’ incomes and providing suitable risk management measures for timely compensation to farmers.

While underscoring the need to complete the unfinished agenda in land reforms, it called for community-centred food, water and energy security systems and to ensure nutrition security for everyone.

The policy wanted the government to introduce measures to retain youth in farming, make India a global outsourcing hub in production and supply of the inputs needed for sustainable agriculture and restructure the agriculture curriculum.

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