Loan waivers won’t stop farmer suicides: Agricultural scientists

O P Yadav, agriculture scientist and director of CAZRI, said, “Our farmers are not getting fair price for their crop despite the fact the farmers have increased the production of their crops five times in the past 68 years.”

“Loan waivers will neither double the farmers income by 2022 nor it will stop the farmers’ suicides in the country,” he said.

Even as political parties are going all out to woo the farming community by announcing loan waivers, Dr O P Yadav, agriculture scientist and director of CAZRI (Central Arid Zone Research Institute), Jodhpur, feels this is a “negative approach” and would not be sustainable in the long run. He said farmers should be paid remunerative price of their crop not such loan waivers.

“Loan waivers will neither double the farmers income by 2022 nor it will stop the farmers’ suicides in the country,” he said.

Talking to The Indian Express on the sidelines of an ongoing session on agriculture achievements, Yadav, said, “Our farmers are not getting fair price for their crop despite the fact the farmers have increased the production of their crops five times in the past 68 years.”

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“Farmers have increased the quality and quantity of their crop by their hard work and adopting the new technology but there is no market for their crop because India wants to provide cheap food to its consumer so who will pay fair price to the farmers,” he questioned.

He said that instead of giving loans to the farmers we should invest that loan money in the development of the infrastructure related to setting up the processing units to have Value added food, drip irrigation and food providing the transportation vans from one state to other where there is a demand of that crop and farmers can get a fair price for it.

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