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Journalism of Courage
The efforts of Gujarat, ruled by the BJP, in ensuring power supply to farmers has received laurels from an unexpected quarter — the Congress-led UPA government at the Centre.
“Gujarat has shown us the way on how to fix power (problem) for agriculture,” Finance Minister P Chidambaram said, even as he expressed concern in general over problems related to electricity, seeds and fertiliser.
Of the five inputs in agriculture sector, the country has done well on credits and is beginning to do well on water, thanks to the massive outlays and irrigation projects, he said.
However, it has neglected seeds, got a completely distorted fertiliser subsidy regime and failed ‘miserably’ on the power front, he said, adding that Gujarat has shown the country a way to fix power problem in agriculture.
“With seeds, we made a beginning last year. We are trying to increase the replacement rate of seeds and with fertilisers, there is clear way out provided we are willing to bite the bullet. If all these five things come together, agriculture will grow at a very rapid rate of more than four per cent a year,” the Finance Minister said.
But even if it grows at four per cent, farmers will continue to remain poor because of the large numbers dependent on agriculture, he added.
The solution of the problem is to wean farmers away from agriculture into industrial services — not urban slums, just non-farm related activity, he said.
“Do away with the romantic idea that we can continue to sustain 60 per cent of our population on agriculture,” Chidambaram said.
