-The Indian Express Karnataka’s experience shows success depends on taking along all stakeholders. The government of India launched the National Agricultural Market Scheme in July 2015 in 585 markets and has, since April 14, started e-trading on the platform. This is in line with the Union Budget’s target to double farmers’ incomes in six years. To be sure, a doubling of incomes by 2022 would require them to grow at an annual...
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Golden yields - Focusing on agriculture alone will not improve farm incomes -Shubhashis Gangopadhyay
-The Telegraph The recent budget talked about the government's plan to double farm incomes in the next five years. This will be done through investments in rural infrastructure, especially irrigation. About 50 per cent of land under foodgrain production in India is irrigated. This means that half of the foodgrain producing land in India faces weather uncertainties and, hence, those working on them face annual (seasonal) variations in income. These variations...
More »Questions that need answers -Paranjoy Guha Thakurta
-The Asian Age As one listened to finance minister Arun Jaitley deliver his third Budget speech, the overwhelming impression that was sought to be created was along anticipated lines. Here was a government whose heart was bleeding for the hapless farmer toiling in the fields, the agriculturist whose livelihood has been all but destroyed by two successive monsoon failures. Here was an administration whose representatives were concerned about the “curse of...
More »Budget expectations for rural sector
Amidst uncertainty over India's performance in terms of agricultural production and livelihood security of rural population, the Union Budget of 2016-17 will be presented by Finance Minister Shri Arun Jaitley on 29 February. Given the extent of drought in more than 10 states of India during 2015-16, it is expected that the NDA Government will allocate more resources for rejuvenating the rural sector. Since the country has seen two years of...
More »Growth data send conflicting signals
-The Hindu The latest GDP data released by the Central Statistics Office (CSO) raise more questions than they answer. While on the face of it, the projection of 7.6 per cent growth at constant prices for the fiscal year ending March 31 sounds both attainable and impressive, a closer look at the other sets of numbers, including the third-quarter reading, raises some flags. The pace of economic expansion is estimated to...
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