Farming has to be made sustainable: Siraj Hussain, Agriculture Secretary who prepared a roadmap for agriculture policy during MODI-1 regime

Farming has to be made sustainable: Siraj Hussain, Agriculture Secretary who prepared a roadmap for agriculture policy during MODI-1 regime (The interview appeared in the Stateman on Feb3, 2017.

Former Agriculture Secretary Siraj Hussain is one of the key persons behind the launch of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s favourite crop insurance scheme, Pradhan Mantri Fasal BimaYojna, which was introduced in January last year. He was also behind starting procurement of pulses at market rates under the Price Stabilisation Fund. An IAS officer of the 1979 batch, Mr Hussain served in various positions in the government. During his 35 years of service, he was Chairman and Managing Director of Food Corporation of India, Vice-Chancellor of Jamia Hamdard University and Managing Director of the UP State Industrial Development Corporation (UPSIDC).

His last assignment was as Secretary, Ministry of Agriculture, Cooperation and Farmers’ Welfare. In the Agriculture Ministry, he contributed to streamlining Agriculture Trade Policy, the National Agriculture Development Project, Natural Resources Management and Agriculture Extension. He had also initiated the much talked about E-National Agriculture Market (E-NAM). In an interview with VIJAY THAKUR, Mr Hussain spoke about the performance of the Modi government in the agriculture sector. Excerpts:

Q: The Modi government has set an impressive target of doubling farmers’ incomes.  Do you think it will be able to meet the target and what more is needed to achieve it?

A: Actually, the government should first bring more clarity on what they mean by doubling farmers’ incomes. Do they want to double the real income of farmers or do they want to double the nominal income of farmers? If it is the former, the government needs to do much more.

But all this is not very easy. First, the government should take large-scale initiatives to diversify cropping pattern ~ from cereals to other crops. Farmers should be encouraged to diversify from cereals to horticulture, dairy, fisheries. Secondly, the marketing of agricultural produce should be much better organised.

We have recently seen how badly farmers were affected due to demonetisation. The prices of vegetables have gone down considerably. There were few takers for pulses in some areas as there was a bumper crop. Government has to devise a mechanism to ensure farmers receive the correct price.

Thirdly, farmers should be encouraged to use better technologies. Besides adopting good farming practices, the seed replacement ratio has to be achieved, from conventional seeds to new hybrid and GM crop seeds. Lastly and most importantly, efforts should be made to bring down expenditure of farmers to make farming more sustainable.

Here we should also not forget that the Indian agriculture sector depends mainly upon the monsoon. If in the next five years there is a good rain, farmers’ incomes may double provided the government takes some special initiatives on diversification of crops and better marketing strategy. Having said that, I would say this sector mainly depends on good rains. If, like in previous years we face two or three bad monsoons, it would not be easy to double farmers’ incomes.

Q: Pradhan Mantri Fasal BimaYojna (PMFBY) was introduced when you were the Union Agriculture Secretary. How do you see its performance?

A: The crop insurance scheme has been quite successful in some respects. The sum insured under PMFBY has now reached Rs1,36,000 crore from Rs 69,000 crore last year. It is good that the sum insured has increased substantially. But the area insured has increased marginally from 3.38 crore hectares to 3.80 crore hectares, only a 12 per cent increase. Special stress should be laid to increase the crop area.

When this scheme was introduced it was presumed that modern technologies would be used to evaluate crop damage in time and more accurately. Unfortunately, this has not happened on the ground and little use of technology is visible in crop assessment. It was thought that all the revenue staff …