Farmers want Gujarat govt to address price issues

Farmers want the state government to set up an Agriculture Commission to institutionalise the pricing of their produce, so that they are not at the mercy of market forces. This is one of their major expectations from the upcoming budget. They have also sought better electricity and irrigation facilities as well as post-harvest infrastructure to store agriculture products.

Sagar Rabari, General Secretary of Khedut Samaj – Gujarat, said that it was necessary to protect the farmers in the state from the vagaries of nature and uncertainties of the market. “Agriculture Commission should be formed at the earliest to evolve scientific methodologies to determine the price of the agricultural crops,” he said. Farmers have asked the state government to set up post-harvest infrastructure in a decentralised fashion so that farmers can wait till their crops fetch remunerative prices, instead of succumbing to distress sales. “It is typical of crops that during season, they grow in plenty resulting prices to drop. Farmers need to be empowered to time the market,” said Rabari.

Another major area where farmers want the government to take initiatives is the food processing sector.

They want the administration to set up smaller food processing facilities in villages, rather than mega food parks. “Smaller parks will ensure that value addition of crops is done in villages itself leading to higher prices of the produce and job creation in villages to prevent migration to cities,” he added.

The state farmers have also asked the government to help them get better irrigation and electricity facilities. Though the government has built the Sardar Sarovar dam, farmers are still not getting enough irrigation water because of the lack of minor canals that still need to be constructed at many places. The central government in its recent Union Budget had announced that farmers will get prices that are 50% higher than their production cost. The NGO wants the government to make the methodology to determine production cost more realistic and transparent.

Other demands put forward by the farmers include Rs 10,000-crore corpus for farm debt-waiver, removal of provision of forceful acquisition of land under a plethora of laws, higher loans for farmers, re-inclusion of land that was excluded from irrigation projects, and withdrawal of police cases against agitating farmers, among others.

RISE OF THE RURAL

• Rural voters had shown anger against gov-ernment during the recent Assembly elections in the state, and they expect the government to take corrective measures as the countdown to the state budget has began.
   
• Farmers want the the administration to set up smaller food processing facilities in villages, rather than mega food parks.