-News18.com Calling for reorganisation of the agriculture sector and crop diversification, Mihir Shah said that agriculture must be thought of as an enterprise. Delhi: Incentivising cultivation of water-efficient crops and not “maniacal” river-linking is the need of the hour as the crippling water crisis bears down on India’s agrarian economy, former Planning Commission member and water conservationist Dr Mihir Shah has said. Calling for a reorganisation of the agriculture sector and crop...

-Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER), Working Paper 383 Farmers, especially small and marginal, do not directly trade in agri-futures market in India. Their small size, lack of trust and understanding of futures market and dependence on middlemen, are some of the main deterrents. The role of Farmer Producer Organizations (FPOs) is crucial in this context since they can procure commodities, aggregate them and ensure that size and...

-Mumbai Mirror Modi, with his brilliant communication skills along with the media at his disposal, managed to convince farmers to give him a longer rope A senior farm leader had once told me in a regretful tone: “Whenever farmers are denied their rightful crop insurance, or they are harassed by banks for loan recovery, they come to us. We agitate, protest and resist the system’s bullying of farmers. But the same farmers...

  The budgetary allocation for Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) as a proportion of total budgetary expenditure has been reduced marginally during the Interim Budget 2019-20. It may have happened because the coverage of gross cropped area under the scheme could not keep pace with the target that was set during the last two years. The Status of Implementation of Budget Announcements 2017-18, which was presented during the Union Budget 2018-19,...

-The Economic Times blog As policymakers debate what form of income support will cure India’s extensive farm distress, we have a study whose insights suggest that the right policy has to look beyond ratcheting up support prices to unsustainable levels and cash transfers to farmers. Agricultural policy is deeply flawed and calls for structural reform. This crisis can no longer be contained with band-aid. It calls for proper diagnosis and remedy. Such...