Long Struggle: Minimum Support Price turned profitable

There is also a lack of awareness among a large section of the farmers regarding the sale at MSP. Now farmer organizations have started raising some basic questions which are proving to be quite inconvenient for the government side.

Long Struggle: Minimum Support Price turned profitable

After a long struggle of one year, the rejection of all the three agricultural laws by the Central Government by the Parliament is a big achievement of the farmer’s movement.

It is important that the Prime Minister has also expressed regret and has prayed for his return in the address to the nation.

Generally, such kind of polite address by the head of government is rarely available, this decision has been welcomed by the constituent parties of Kisan Morcha, but keeping the demand to bring Minimum Support Price (MSP) under the legal provision.

He has rejected the suggestion to end the strike.

MSP has been implemented by the central government for about 23 crops, but according to the latest report of the NSO, the reality is that only five crops are sold at 10 per cent or more of the MSP.

The obtained figures present a very disappointing picture. Paddy, Wheat and sugarcane only sell well at MSP, but this too has recorded a maximum of forty per cent.

For example, between July-December 2019, the details of sales at MSP of a total of 13 crops have been collected, according to which 23.7 per cent of the yield of paddy, 18.4 per cent of sugarcane, 13 per cent of soybean, 1.5 per cent of urad and 10.9 per cent of groundnut.

Only the produce could be sold at an MSP rate, while eight other crops, including jowar, bajra, maize, ragi, tur, moong, coconut and cotton, failed to sell even 10 per cent of their MSP rate.

There is also a lack of awareness among a large section of the farmers regarding the sale at MSP.

Now farmer organizations have started raising some basic questions which are proving to be quite inconvenient for the government side.

At present, about 11 crore families are engaged in agriculture, out of which about 70 per cent of farmers have less than one hectare of cultivable land.

If we take the example of the prosperous state of Punjab, then there is a potential to produce about 50 quintals of wheat in one hectare of land, but due to limited irrigated resources in Uttar Pradesh, the wheat potential is estimated to be only 35 quintals.

A farmer in Punjab earns about Rs 35,000 worth of crop in one hectare of land a year, according to government data, while a farmer in Uttar Pradesh has to be content with a profit of only Rs 15,000 per hectare of the crop year.

This position is for those circumstances where the sale is possible at the price declared by the Government. The conclusion is that the farmers of the entire country including Punjab, Haryana and Western Uttar Pradesh have to depend on mandis and artisans and have to settle the crops at throwaway prices.

As a result of the crisis of farming and farmers, about 52.5 per cent of the farmers are burdened with debt. Farmers’ organizations believe that until the Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices does not get a constitutional status and the suggestions were given by it are not fully accepted, then these institutions have no meaning.

The parties involved in the UPA and NDA had promised to fix the support price by implementing the Dr Swaminathan formula in their manifestos, which was not fulfilled in any regime.

United Kisan Morcha feels that with the MSP announced by the government, the farmer will suffer a loss of Rs 611 to Rs 2027 per quintal on different crops.

While declaring the prices, the governments make a big trumpet about how the remunerative price has increased, but the C-2+50 per cent formula is completely ignored in the announcement.

This is the opportune time to constitute a new Farmers Commission, which has a constitutional status like other commissions and whose decisions are bound to be implemented by the governments.