Need to fix agri infrastructure, improve post-harvest linkages

Punjab needs to address yawning gaps in infrastructure supporting the agricultural sector. Improving post-harvest and marketing infrastructure is critical to unlock the potential of various segments in the agri-business supply chain.

While India is set to harvest a record food grain production of 260 million tonnes due to good monsoons and achieve five per cent growth, it is ironic that 17 per cent of the people are still under-nourished while 40 per cent of agriculture produce is wasted for want of storage facilities.

On the other hand, Parliament in September last year passed the National Food Security Act (NFSA) which is the world’s largest social welfare scheme. It guarantees access to subsidised food to 70 per cent of the 1.2 billion population.

The central government is now legally bound to provide each of 800 million people – nearly the combined populations of the United States and the European Union – with five kg of subsidised food grains every month.

I believe the landmark initiative should be led by strong domestic production. Besides being dependent on vagaries of the monsoon, agriculture in our country faces serious issues of food security and wastage in the supply chain.

There have been some encouraging developments in the recent past like public private partnerships in contract farming, drip irrigation projects and terminal markets. These can be extended to other areas like logistics, cold storage and warehousing. This is crucial for agriculture development in India.

Conducive government policies are required to attract private equity capital also. At the same time, successful large-scale replication of innovative models in agri-infrastructure will lead to evolution of organised, high-tech, demand-led and high-value orientation. These innovations could have significant advantages  if identified, localised and scaled up as part of rural developmentprogrammes.   

The agriculture sector accounts for 14 per cent of the country's total GDP. Some two-third of India’s people depend on rural employment for a living.

High levels of wastage, low productivity levels, falling private and public investments, scarcity of land, water and labour are some issues that have led to supply constraints. The mismatch between demand and supply has been further exacerbated by the rapid increase in food consumption on account of demographic changes.

The public private partnership route presents an excellent opportunity that has already had some success in states like Punjab and will need to be implemented systematically across the country. However, the long-term solution to correcting these supply deficiencies lies in drastic improvement in farm level productivity.

This can be achieved through investments in research and development in agri-sciences and subsequent information systems required to transfer this knowledge and monitor progress with farmers.

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Women’s safety

By Arvind Khanna

The recent death of an acid attack victim from Barnala in a Mumbai hospital has once again raised concerns among people about the safety of women in India, particularly young girls. While any attack on a woman is tragic, the tragedy in the Barnala girl’s case was more extreme than anyone one could imagine. The girl was getting ready in a Ludhiana beauty parlour for her wedding the same night. That fate would take such a devastatingly tragic turn, nobody would have imagined, much less her parents who have been left traumatised and grieving.

Only last year the entire nation rose against the brutal gangrape and murder of Nirbhaya, the Delhi medico, which led to the question, is Delhi safe for women? Stringent rape law was enacted. But that did not stop the incidents of rapes and attacks on women. This has only established that merely enacting laws, howsoever stringent these might be, does not serve any purpose as long as these are not implemented strictly to deter and discourage others from resorting to such dastardly acts.

We need to think that a girl or a lady is a daughter, a sister, a mother, a wife and a friend to somebody. We need to change our attitudes toward women. As a parent myself I feel shocked and shaken at the daily reports that appear with alarming regularity about the atrocities against  women. The latest being the gangrape and setting on fire of a girl in West Bengal. These are too heart wrenching. When will the day come when this all will be a thing of the past?

There is no reason why technological advances should not be used in facilitating women’s security. There can be specially devised safety devices for women, besides emergency helplines especially dedicated to women. So far there is no emergency response system for women’s security in India, anywhere which needs to be set up at the earliest. While we have made a small start in New Delhi, Punjab must also make a beginning.

It is sad that we have not been able to set a common SOS helpline number which a woman can dial in distress and receive the appropriate support. We need to make our towns and villages safer and secure for women. We need to create an atmosphere where a girl should feel free to move anytime and anywhere she wants and likes. We need to do this together and not leave it to some social workers across India. When we call for empowerment of women in India it cannot be possible without ensuring the safety and security of women in India.

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