Present status of agriculture in India

                   “Agriculture is the backbone Indian Economy”

(By Khemeshwar Bagale, Srikant Karnevar)

This sentence has permanently occupied the space in each Indians brain right from their childhood. It is because for Indians agriculture is not just a way of making money but it’s a culture, a religion for them. The Soil which grows the plant is given the place of mother. It has been the biggest profession to India and many other countries of the world since time immortal. When it comes to economics it is a major sector of the Indian economy, contributing 26% of GDP with allied sectors and provides 60% of employment and continues to be the primary source of living for 70% of population. Hence the overall economic development of the country largely depends on technological progress in agriculture. As compared to last few decades, today we are self sufficient in food production, making good exports in international market, we could now able to provide basic food to all population falls under the poverty line. Many people deprived of basic food now can fulfil their requirement. “In the last ten years, our food grain production increased from 198 million tonnes in 2004-05 to 259 million tonnes estimated currently.” Overall it is important to note that the food grain production has continuously increased despite a virtual ceiling on cultivable area, our agricultural universities have identified critical areas in agriculture that need urgent attention and expected thoughts for enhancement in synergy and partnership with farmers and industries. As Per the 2010 FAO world agriculture statistics, India is the world's largest producer of many fresh fruits and vegetables, milk, major spices, select fresh meats, select fibrous crops such as jute, several staples such as millets and castor oil seed. India is the second largest producer of wheat and rice, the world's major food staples. And absolutely it would not have become possible without uncountable contribution of the Agricultural scientists, Regional Krushi Vigyan Kendra (Agriculture Science Centre), technical experts, academicians, and last but not least a farmer who has been encouraged to continue farming besides he has been boosted with confidence and also continuously supported with technical guidance from farm to fork. Research happening in universities, is always have been crossing the boundaries of university campus to the yard of farmer, no matter what area of yard is, either in acre or hector. Having been provided all facilities, funds by govt to universities, at the end it seems that they have utilized them with value addition and haven’t left any stone unturned in the entire journey from establishment to till date.

Having been discussed all this favourable points towards the agricultural system in India but there are still some issues those needs to be addressed very soon and also we need to top up the standards, quality in entire agriculture system to meet the universal standard.

In view of present global scenario we need market-led, commercialized, efficient, competitive and dynamic agricultural sector within the context of sustainable development. And it may be possible with aim to increase and strengthen agricultural production, exports, agro-based processing activities, market and global networking, and improve the delivery service system to ultimately elevate the income levels of farmers by adopting MASTER PLAN.

In deed extension has to be a combination of strategies for augmenting workforce to support delivery of extension services to the farmers, together with adopting innovative approaches. Till date ICAR has now 637 KVKs spread across the country to showcase production potential of different technologies.

India has one of the largest agricultural research, teaching and extension systems in the world with the largest number of scientific personnel of any developing country engaged in research and education relating to agriculture and allied areas. The Indian research system includes approximately 30,000 scientists and more than 100,000 supporting staff actively engaged in research related agriculture. The agricultural research system in India comprises two main streams, ICAR at national level and the agricultural universities at state level both are actively involved in teaching, research, education and extension.

The agricultural extension system is the most important part for transferring the technologies developed by scientists in the farmer’s fields without which there is no use of research done.  Extension plays a vital and significant role in most agricultural development projects. It requires the strengthening of extension system in India. KVKs are doing the best of it and are helping the farmers in all the ways to adopt new technologies on their farm by various programs. The extension system needs to cope up with the changing scenario with its new strategy and approach to reach farmers not only with basket of technological options, but also with information of new market opportunities and gain, more profit and sustainability of income. For this purpose the extension is to be redefined, redesigned and equipped with several solutions to the problems of different groups of farmers, with varied dimensions of land holdings, farmer’s situations and income.

It requires location specific and need based extension strategies and approaches, use of new communication channels and media support in extension, human resource development and management in agriculture extension, and change in present policies to build effective extension strategy.

 Farmers need to be recognized as co-creators of knowledge in agriculture, encouraged and respected for the innovations they develop. Farmers and research institutions must be linked in a web of knowledge creation and application, with joint responsibility for improving production and productivity through joint trials, participatory innovation, and farmer validation of scientists’ claims.

“Agriculture not only feeds people, it, builds close-knit families and societies.”

National systems and multilateral agencies should support this process, with NGOs, private companies and farmers’ organizations facilitating accountability. Planning of production for local markets and according to local needs would avoid mismatch and waste. Application of force majeure clauses in production agreements would eliminate much of the risk. Subsidies and artificially lowered prices of commodities as social welfare measures have proven to be hotbeds of corruption and disincentives to farmers and should be avoided as all we are witnessing these with sugarcane not only in western Maharashtra but all over India.

Agriculture not only feeds people, it creates engagement and employment in sustainable livelihoods, builds close-knit families and societies (especially smallholder and family farming) and supports cultural and social engagement as well as social stability. In today’s world it provides an alternative way of living away from the stress and strain of urban areas. It preserves our farm landscape, traditions and heritage. We all have a responsibility to protect and enhance our agricultural heritage—and that means not allowing a single farmer or farm labourer to go hungry or to suffer for trying to make a living in agriculture.

To meet the ever increasing population of the nation, the agriculture production must be accelerated at similar level with improved technologies like biotechnology. Along with old practices of improving the yield of crops such as breeding, the new technologies such as biotechnology or even nanotechnology in agriculture must be utilized vigorously. The Indian Biotechnology sector is one of the major knowledge based sectors in India and is contributing significantly to shaping India's rapidly growing economy. Biotechnology has wide areas of application in agriculture, animal husbandry, development of medicines and vaccine, treatment of prolonged disease, pollution control and waste management and ecological conservation, energy production and conservation and many more. India is one of the countries to adopt biotech crop i.e Bt cotton at large scale. About 80% of cotton grown in india is the Bt cotton.  The adoption of this technology has made possible the change of status of India as net exporter of cotton from importer of cotton. This example of GM Bt cotton is more than enough to assess the potential of biotechnology for improving the agricultural production. Many GM crops like Brinjal, Cabbage, Okra, rice, potato etc are under pipeline for either development or almost ready for commercialization.  There are many other products of allied technologies like tissue culture which are prominent in market today right from medicines to many secondary metabolites. Production of secondary metabolites from plants increases the value of the agriculture products and helps the farmers to get the more income from their field by growing such medicinally important crops or the crops for secondary metabolite extraction.

In addition to this biotechnology also been employed in private industries for propagation of floriculture crops. Many hundreds of the species of flower crops like Orchids, Gerberas, Carnation, Chrysanthemum, and many more are propagated with the help of tissue culture and exported to foreign countries. These propagated plants posses the unique and productive quality. Besides quality and sustainable production in agriculture, biotechnology and its adoption in commercial sectors also have generated huge employment for literate as well as for illiterate people and especially women. Commercial tissue culture labs established in India are providing lakhs of employment opportunities to wide range of class i.e from illiterate to doctorate degree holders.

Therefore Biotech is boon to Indian agriculture sector and more efforts must be taken to increase it adaptability.

In addition to all theses parameters, the post harvest losses of Indian must be taken into the consideration. It is estimated that the post harvest losses in India about 2 lacks core. To address the post harvest losses the more emphaseis should be given to post harvest management of agriculture produce and at the same time food processing industries should be encouraged to process the food after harvesting to make it value added.

Food processing industry is one of the vast growing sector that has gained significant importance among all other industries. It is fastest growing sector because of availability of cheap labours, raw materials, changing lifestyles and appropriate fiscal policies has given a considerable push to the industry’s growth. This sector serves as a vital link between the agriculture and industrial segments of the economy. Strengthening this link is of critical importance to reduce waste of agricultural raw materials, improve the value of agricultural  produce by increasing shelf-life as well  as by fortifying the nutritive capacity of the food products; ensure remunerative prices to farmers as well as affordable prices to consumers. Adequate focus on this sector could greatly alleviate our concerns on food security and food inflation. India already is a leading exporter of several food products. To ensure that this sector gets the stimulus it deserves, Ministry of Food Processing Industries is implementing a number of  schemes for Infrastructure development, technology up-gradation & modernization, human resources development and R&D in the Food Processing Sector

Presently the agricultural education is provided by the agricultural universities, general universities and other central institutions like BHU etc. Changing pattern of agriculture education is worth to be praised however we still need to be improve a lot to meet international level standards in field of research and academics. It has been found that, more than 60% of agriculture graduates are not turning to the agriculture profession, many other services are fascinating them except much agriculture. We can however see the drastic changes in agriculture education unless the (education) system as a whole improves, attempts to impose the so called modern/Western models of teaching and learning in Agriculture Universities. Having all the pitfalls in our current education system (in India) and its intertwined consequences..., how could one put the entire blame on the University academics for the misery in the status of higher education in Agriculture Universities? The entire system is to be put under scrutiny; not just the teaching and teachers.... We have well enough gained in research field but what about its recognition at international level excluding some results. Admission criteria to PhDs to should be more versatile as like International universities, just not on the basis of written marks.  It will help the universities to get creative minds and Nobel outcomes can be expected. The collaboration with foreign universities will be helpful for students and faculty exchange program and it will enable to students and faculty to experience the bouquet of different cultures.    

The view of society looking towards agriculture sector is changing day by day. Few years ago agriculture was just a traditional way to make money now it has blended with so many other supportive sectors to make it value addition business. The same case is with education, in earlier days agriculture college campus were buzzed with only rural student but now many students from urban area opting  themselves for agriculture education. This increasing population of students to agriculture education have proved that the young India has widen their horizons to look after their career, however as stated earlier the efforts must be taken to provides maximum working opportunities before them. Women’s contribution to agriculture sector cannot be neglected since their share in farming society is significant from the history of agriculture in India. Large population of women is engaged in agriculture business, academics, and research. Women have already broken their traditional limitation of being remain in four walls and now they have sprayed their wings to achieve a pinnacle in all sectors including agriculture.

To conclude, India cannot be imagined without agriculture, it always been just more than a profession for billions of Indian population. No doubt India have achieved a lot in agriculture production, still there is a need to accelerate the rate of production with keeping environmental sustainability with recent technology. It is therefore a humble a appeal to each Indian to respect the agriculturist, a farming community and their contribution to this journey would be highly obliged.