Committing itself to a sustained growth of four per cent in the farm sector, the government on Thursday announced in its Budget a technology-driven second green revolution with emphasis on higher productivity and a “protein revolution.”
However, in a year when drought is looming large on the country, farmers are disappointed that no announcement has been made regarding an Income Insurance Scheme for them. Also, no additional funds have been set aside for farmers for relief from drought conditions when kharif sowing is yet to commence.
Presenting the 2014-15 Budget, Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, however, announced the setting up of a Price Stabilisation Fund with a corpus of Rs. 500 crore to help farmers deal with volatility, lowering of interest rate by 3 per cent on short-term crop loans for timely payment, finance to five lakh Bhoomi Heen Kisan Joint Farming Groups, soil health cards for farmers, mobile soil-testing laboratories and an Agri-Tech Infrastructure Fund. The agri-tech fund will be used to make farming competitive and profitable, step up public and private investment, develop agro-technology and modernise existing agri-business infrastructure.
Exclusive channelA Kisan TV channel will be launched for providing real-time information on new techniques, water conservation and organic farming.
“Price volatility in agriculture produce creates uncertainties and hardship for farmers. To mitigate this, I am providing a sum of Rs. 500 crore for establishing a Price Stabilisation Fund,” said Mr. Jaitley presenting his maiden Budget.
Agricultural varsitiesTwo more institutions on the lines of the Indian Agriculture Research Institute, Pusa, will be set up in Assam and Jharkhand. Agriculture Universities will be set up in Andhra Pradesh and Rajasthan, and Horticulture Universities in Telangana and Haryana.
A fund of Rs. 100 crore has been set aside for providing every farmer a soil health card and Rs. 56 crore for mobile soil-testing laboratories. The fund for enhancing warehousing capacity has been enhanced to Rs. 5,000 crore.
To accelerate setting up of a National Common Market, the Centre will work closely with the State governments to amend their respective Agriculture Produce Marketing Committee Acts, for establishment of private market yards/ private markets, Mr. Jaitley said.
The State governments will also be encouraged to develop farmers’ markets in town areas to enable farmers to sell their produce directly.
Funds have been allocated for development of indigenous cattle breeds and a blue revolution in inland fisheries.
“This is a lot more than what we had hoped for,” Agriculture Minister Radha Mohan Singh told The Hindu .
However, the Alliance for Sustainable and Holistic Agriculture, an NGO, said the budget had no policy directions to address farm livelihood crisis and did not take cognisance of farmers’ suicides.
