The total number of farm suicides in the country has reduced from 12,602 to 11,370 between 2015 and 2016 viz. a fall by 9.8 percent. This has been revealed recently in a reply by the Minister of State in the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare Shri Parshottam Rupala in the Lok Sabha. So, one may wonder why there is such a hue and cry about rural distress and agrarian crisis...
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Rural Distress: 9 Crore Applied For MGNREGS Work Last Year -Subodh Varma
-Newsclick.in Shrinking farm incomes, frozen wages and lack of jobs is driving people to work in the scheme for a pittance. Nearly 9 crore Indians applied for work in the rural jobs guarantee scheme (MGNREGS) in 2017-18, according to data put out by the ministry of rural development. That’s a staggering 42% of the rural work force. Of those who applied for work, some 1.4 crore persons (or about 15%) were turned...
More »Farm distress: direct income support 'less distortionary', says ICRIER study -TV Jayan
-The Hindu Business Line New Delhi: Giving direct income support (DIS) to farmers — similar to what Telangana recently launched — may be a better option than the price deficiency payment (PDP) scheme or higher minimum support price (MSP) to address farm distress, according to a new study. Paying higher MSP based on cost-plus pricing would lead to market distortion. PDP schemes such as Bhavantar Bhugtan Yojana (BBY), which was in force...
More »Niti Aayog misses deadline to suggest MSP procurement model, farmers continue to bear brunt -Anuradha Shukla
-The Indian Express NEW DELHI: The government’s ambitious minimum support price (MSP) scheme to improve farmers’ income has hit a roadblock as Niti Aayog missed the deadline to suggest a viable procurement model. Finance minister Arun Jaitley had announced in his Budget speech the government would ensure agriculture produce is procured at the revised MSP, which will be 1.5 times the production cost. The Centre had entrusted the think tank with...
More »The Curious Case of MGNREGA wages -Harsha Pareek
-Hindkisan.com Alarmingly, despite wages paid under MGNREGA being much lower than the standard minimum wage in most states, increasing number of people from rural households are applying for jobs under the employment scheme. This trend is an indicator of the mounting distress in the rural economy which is aggravated by paucity of jobs. Mocking the economic condition of the distressed rural working community, the Union Government has decided to uphold the low...
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