India centric agriculture and rural development for Atmanirbhar Bharat

July 20, 2022
S.B. Dangayach

India centric agriculture and rural development for Atmanirbhar Bharat

Agriculture is the foundation of India and has close linkage with water, energy, food, fertiliser, nutrition, health and climate change. With diverse climates India is the cradle of wide variety of crops that are starting materials for many processed products. Despite several schemes and programmes of governments, share of agriculture in GDP is falling continuously and stands at 14%.

Rural industries based on agriculture and other resources are in similar slot with their proportion dropping steadily. Services offered by rural and remote areas are losing out due to favourable factors driving urbanisation and shift of talent, technology and trade to urban pockets.

We are celebrating 75 years of independence that has been a mix of several successes and failures. Despite freedom on the physical plane, we are continuing to suffer from mental and intellectual inadequacies resulting into adherence to thoughts and practices from the Western world either in pristine form or modified versions. Whereas in the initial decades we had adopted Western socialism or communism, in later decades we have gone for capitalism. Our inability to aim for India centric economic policy is clear from the fact that “Arthashashtra “of Kautilya , now lauded as the founder of modern economics , is absent from libraries and curricula of all economics and business schools of India.

Our diffidence is also obvious from the reading of essay on “science “in Wikipedia where India is conspicuously absent as a contributor in the fields of Mathematics, Astronomy, Health etc despite having been the pioneers in the world.

In the field of finance, we are oblivious to drainage of our wealth in offshore tax havens controlled by old colonisers and lack the courage to question defective financial architecture harming us.

In the backdrop of the above developments, clarion call for Atmanirbhar Bharat is timely and laudable.

Independent India centric thinking is the basic need for Atmanirbhar Bharat.

Innovative Thought Forum (ITF) and Swadeshi Jagaran Manch (SJM ) have arranged round tables of domain experts on the theme of “pragmatic ways for Atmanirbhar Bharat”on following subjects recently and have come up with an anthology containing 75 articles by India centric thought leaders to suggest feasible and practical ways for making India stronger.

Foreign trade
Internal trade and e commerce
Finance and taxation
Health and wellness
Skilling and employment
Education and research
Environment and climate change
Energy and water
Farming, Fertilisers and Foods
Land and infrastructure
Defence and space
Technology and entrepreneurship

Common themes emerging from the above deliberations were

Designing or engineering for proper utilisation of our resources
Waste reduction /reuse/recycle /recover /recreate (5R principle )
Integrated and holistic costing taking into account capex and opex
Continuous skilling of Human Resources for building internal capacity for optimum quality output
Concomitant changes in education , research and programmes for India centric thinking and action
Transition from present Western model of capitalism 1.0 based on pure profits (Shudhh Labh ) to Indian model of capitalism 2.0 based on ethical profits (Shubh Labh)

Major issues with agriculture and rural industries

Though all the governments have apparently talked for growth of agriculture and local industries citing massive employment in the sector and need to improve all parameters for rural masses, gap between rural and urban populations is increasing . Sincerity and diligence are generally low for agricultural and rural pursuits that is generally attempted to be covered with subsidies or give a ways. Important issues are many such as

Under-performance of Agriculture–Low growth rate of 3 per cent over recent decades
Continuing decline of share of Agriculture in GDP—Now @14 per cent only
Inefficiencies in use of resources like water,land and energy
Increasing burden of subsidies without commensurate gains
High post harvest losses in horticulture,aquaculture and foodgrains
Decreasing interest of youth in agriculture driving migration to urban areas
Poor value addition in rural areas
Poor availability of power for desired processing
Lack of entrepreneurial talent , energy and ecosystem in rural areas

Causes for the above issues

There are many reasons for the problems as mentioned above. The governance structure prevailing today is an extension of colonial past and reflects lower priority in everything. The paradigm is to go for giving subsidy selectively and not really work towards capacity building and genuine empowerment. Here are a few prominent causes

Inertia in adoption of appropriate technologies. For example slow adoption of proven tools like micro irrigation in many areas
Slow speed of innovation and spread of simple concept like micro irrigation for small and marginal farmers or fish production in small areas with supply of quality seeds
Distortion in optimal use of resources like land and water due to short sighted subsidy based ecosystem
Limited research, development and extension of efforts appropriate for India and it’s people
Lip service to vital inputs like organic manure, validation of it’s properties and application in different crops to reduce dependency on chemical fertilisers
Lack of efforts to turn wasteland into useful pursuits like water harvesting, aquaculture, dairying etc. to boost incomes and livelihoods
Lack of evolution of framework to produce renewable energy from animal waste, biomass ,wind etc at local levels to boost outputs in rural areas of agriculture, horticulture or aquaculture so as to boost food processing and decentralised cold chain
Lack of scientific study on water footprint of different crops to work out crop plan in different zones or areas
Excessive use of water leading to massive wastage, soil damage, soil degradation and contamination due to free or subsidised power in the country
Lack of treatment facilities of sewage to prescribed levels to make it available for agriculture nutrient rich water that can reduce fertiliser demand simultaneously
Absence of innovative thinking on phasing out subsidies or making various arms of the sector attractive to most people
Rigidities in land laws, leasing or renting laws etc. as well as imbalances in statutes for landlords, tenant farmers etc forcing non cultivation and disuse of many resources
Limited cold chain infrastructure at local levels of production leading to reduced incomes to producers, high post harvest losses and fall in quality
Lack of integrated approach to food processing in decentralised format to help create jobs in rural areas
Very high inefficiencies in procurement, storage and distribution of food grains leading to massive carrying costs like Rs 5 per kg (As estimated by Planning Commission)
Association of rural with poor quality shoddy products
Lack of design and customer centric thinking in all policies
Shackling of farmers

Solutions for healthy and hefty progress

We have continued to depend on Western educated and oriented planners and models for solving our problems .New digital technologies are paving the ways for decentralisation in education , skilling , training , employment , healthcare , finance , production .We can adapt and use them with our other tools and knowledge to

Evolve cost effective solutions for small and marginal farmers in resource effective manner (Like telecom revolution that has made mobile affordable to masses)
Focus on sustainable agriculture by mainstreaming resource efficiency and waste management
Demonstrate in near future waste to resource recovery or energy projects that can create additional incomes for rural areas(For example show that Gobar from a cow has an economic value of Rs 20000 + per year if converted to biogas and manure in a biogas plant)
Encourage and scale up use of treated sewage of prescribed quality for agriculture
Innovative uses of wasteland for several profitable activities like aquaculture, poultry, dairying, biomass, solar power, hydroponics etc by a variety of instruments like leasing, cooperative farming etc.
Removal of controls in leasing of land and making contract farming upto a certain level easy and hassle free
Phase out harmful subsidies on fertiliser distorting desirable 4:2;1 NPK use ratio as also power subsidy and plough back saved financial resources into public investment for level playing field for organic manure, micro irrigation, green houses, hydroponics, biogas plants, decentralised renewable energy plants, marketing, extension etc
Bring about convergence and effective coordination across various formations at central, state and local levels
Plan next 5 years for diversification trials as food grain supply expected to exceed demand and nutrition considered very vital for overall health
Integrate decentralised renewable energy plants with cold chain creation at local levels
Involve Swadeshi private sector in last mile infra connectivity
Avoid high inventory carrying costs of foodgrains by efficient logistics ,storage and distribution
Integrate Biotech,Nanotech,Cleantech and ICT in agriculture to boost innovation as well as productivity
Push for modernisation to make agriculture and food processing a hot area for investment and employment
Tap international markets by appropriate as well as value added products in several domains of agriculture -Like organic cotton fabrics ,organic tea etc
Aggressive adoption of Homoeopathy and Ayurveda in healthcare of animals, poultry, fishes etc where they have succeeded
Extra efforts to research and develop Homoeopathic and Ayurvedic formulations to bring down costs as well as prevent contamination of food chain by Allopathic medicines
Highest priority to skilling of agriculture workers by revamping and redrawing relevant extension programmes
Enhancing availability of finance on soft terms and low interest alongwith phasing out of subsidies
Improvement of numerary and digital skills in the country especially rural areas with Edutech
Exposure of all higher secondary and college students to elementary and important aspects of Vyapar or business through simple courses like “Vyapar Sutra”
Treatment of farmers as “ entrepreneurs “and giving them the freedom of doing business throughout the world -Giving aggressive push to tourism and creativity +craft industries all over the country
Adopting lessons from Arthashashtra based on Sanatan Dharma for Sarvodaya of India end globe
Public private partnership (PPP) at local levels by micro and small enterprises

Successful examples

There are many examples of Innovative solutions that show us immense scope of many economic activities for Sarvoday of India

Dhoraji model for plastic waste processing

Dhoraji is a town near Rajkot that had a thriving oil milling industry. When the old business closed down, premises became idle .A few entrepreneurs thought of using these wasted premises for processing of plastic waste into several useful products like tapes, pipes, types etc. Today Dhoraji is the biggest cluster for plastic waste processing with a distinctive ecosystem including Mandi for waste procurement from all over the country and markets for their value added products. As of now over one lakh tonnes is processed leading to huge employment and value addition.

This is a successful model of use of wasted premises, waste materials and surplus or idle manpower to create a sustainable business model without any subsidy or grant.

NDDB model for biogas and organic fertiliser

NDDB and cooperative dairies are mandated to maximise milk and derivatives production so far. Capture of value from Gobar or manure is now getting long overdue attention

In a few villages like Munjkuwa and Jamiatpura , dairy cooperatives have created local Sakhi cooperatives for organic fertilisers. Members have installed family size Biogas plants that give adequate quantity of biogas for cooking besides liquid slurry that is collected from each family for processing into Phosphate rich organic manure (PROM) and other organic fertilisers. This programme pays for itself in less than 2 years without subsidy and can be replicated by all the cooperatives at village level

Lessons from this work shows that so called waste like Gobar helps farmers to meet their cooking energy need while giving additional income to them

Kerala model for health and wellness

Health is prerequisite to all four purusharths of our life (Dharmarth -////)

Wellness is important part of health. Health centres and spas created in rural parts of Kerala and other states show a proper way to leverage our knowledge of Ayurveda to restore health and remaining diseases free on a sustainable basis.

All such centres are operating without any subsidy and can pave the way for enormous development as health improvement is important to all.

Jaipur Rugs for training of rural women for high quality rugs as a role model for “creativity and craft industry”

In the villages around Jaipur and other parts of the country, Jaipur Rugs has been converting their designs into excellent rugs for global markets by training and self employed women. This firm, like many others, are blending their design and marketing knowledge with widely distributed network of processors or converters for weaving.

There is a scope for entrepreneurs to look at such models to generate wealth and distribute to artisan community in equitable manner and to build Creative industries.

NextWealth for using rural youth in small towns for advanced services (www.nextwealth.com)

NextWealth is a social venture providing many advanced technology services internationally like AI/ML Data Services and IT/ BPM services.

NextWealth has over the past decade developed and perfected a unique Distributed Delivery Model that delivers from centers in small towns.

This company trains youth from rural areas and small towns and thereafter deploys them for delivering services all over the world.

Advantages of working in small towns and with NextWealth are significant- Lower attrition, skills availability and lower cost of operations.

NextWealth was started by a few senior experts from Wipro and can be a role model for many such enterprises that train, skill and empower unemployed youth in rural or semi rural areas for generating wealth there.

Economic cluster in South Australia

Sewage is no more a problem in many parts of the world like Israel and parts of Australia. Near Adelaide city a revolutionary economic model has prospered. Sewage of the city is being used to irrigate vineyard and other crops after needful treatment.

Wine produced from grapes now fetch excellent price and have helped in creating new economic model altogether.

Israel has been able to show superior value in nutrients of sewage after suitable treatment and been able to use all the sewage after treatment in most of the areas.

Important lesson from this example is the use of wastewater as resource after suitable treatment which is the basic premise of circular economy.

Conclusions

Agriculture and rural development have indeed received less attention in independent India as evident from honest analysis of plans, programmes, finances, subsidies, attention etc. Glamour and glitz of urbanisation have directly or indirectly led all things rural to inferior position.

It is high time to shed this stereotype by focusing on 5 Es

Education with parts suited for rural India and skilling
Energy secured through several routes especially renewables in suitable mode
Environment by focusing on organic , water efficient and energy efficient farming alongwith waste to wealth enterprises
Employment by appropriate skilling and training as well as creation of jobs in rural enterprises , tourism and agriculture enterprises in rural areas
Entrepreneurship by development of ecosystem to create and empower micro enterprises

It is feasible to shift value addition to rural areas by needful energy availability and entrepreneurial actions on all fronts including brand building and marketing.

Utilisation of wasted lands and wastelands for economic activities in flexible manner by eligible people without change in ownership can be the biggest game changer.

Chanakya and his predecessors always exhorted ethical wealth creation for self and society by all. It is worth invoking and learning from their wisdom to empower farmers and rural enterprises with knowledge and other resources for Atmanirbhar Bharat.

References