-Business Standard The MSP is declared for 23 crops. This means that farmers of other crops or those trying to diversify under contract farming would not have the MSP protection of the Bills Much was made of the Punjab government’s plan to reject the three central laws on agri markets and provide its own protection to famers, especially on prices for their produce. But, the two Bills presented in the state legislature...

-Livemint.com Wide disparities in agri-marketing regulations have resulted in fragmented markets across states. The new farm bills aim to change this but the jury is still out on whether it will have the intended impact. On 26 September, government procurement of food crops commenced across the country, five days in advance, following the enactment of three contentious farm bills. Under the new policy regime, farmers need not sell their produce through designated...

-The Indian Express The actual number could be anywhere between 15 per cent and 25 per cent. “Only 6% of Indian farmers benefit from minimum support prices (MSP)”. So widely-quoted is this figure — especially in the context of the recently-passed Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Act — that it has become a factoid or even truism. What is, isn’t counted The apparent source of the 6% figure is the Shanta...

-The Telegraph The tearing hurry with which agriculture market reforms have been pushed through, without even consulting farmers, has resulted in huge farm protests in Punjab and Haryana At a time when I see euphoria among mainstream economists over the new set of agricultural reforms, media reports say that the Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices has observed that only 12 per cent of India’s paddy cultivators were able to sell their...

-The Indian Express As Opposition and regional parties protest the contentious farm laws, now challenged in Supreme Court, engaging with the key question: Does the enactment of the laws violate the federal principle? On Sunday, the President gave assent to the controversial farm Bills passed by Parliament last week. Amid protests by farmers’ organisations across the country, Chhattisgarh, Maharashtra, and Punjab have said they might not implement the new laws, Kerala and...