Disaster relief for farmers must, says Experts

Experts who have worked with farmers at the grassroots level called for disaster relief and crop insurance as one of the must needed policy-level interventions to help farmers in the country. They also called for a need to put in place a system that ensured price realisation for farmers as despite the MSP many farmers continued to get a low price for their produce.

Kavitha Kuruganti of Alliance for Sustainable & Holistic Agriculture (ASHA) said that even when farmers union pick up cudgels on behalf of farmers, it often concentrates on economic issues. "But what we need is focus on solutions that have both economic and social impact and is environmentally sustainable too," said Kuruganti.

Sridhar Radhakrishnan of Thanal, an organisation in Kerala that has worked on paddy diversity said that an experiment in a panchayat in Kerala has shown that it is possible to have carbon neutral farming.

Stressing on the need to preserve, protect and encourage farming of indigenous seed varieties, he said, "These seeds have over the years developed adaptations to changes in the climate. We have paddy that is flood and drought resistant too. The problem with lab made seeds is that they have not weathered weather vagaries like the indigenous seeds and hence are not able to show the level of resistance that indigenous seeds show," said Radhakrishnan.

Anil Gupta of Honeybee Network that has documented stories and experiments carried out by farmers across the country said that there was a need to protect common resource properties.

"Across the country the common resource properties be it land for grazing or water for use are on the decline and there is a need to protect these. We need to pay attention to management of such properties," said Gupta.

EXPERT SPEAK

Across the country the common resource properties be it land for grazing or water for use are on the decline and there is a need to protect these, said Anil Gupta of Honeybee Network