Convert Grass Into Cheese!
Policy papers exist within the government portals and outside but both the bold and the fine print are difficult to decipher or ineffective in interpretation. Further, the challenge with the policy papers is that not all papers are read by all. It is therefore much less the policy paralysis and much more a case of paraplegia where papers get lost in the fog of files like in the popular BBC series, ‘Yes Prime Minister’ of the papers, says, Jim Hacker, the Prime Minister:
Hacker: Don't tell me about the press. I know exactly who reads the papers. The Daily Mirror is read by people who think they run the country; The Guardian is read by people who think they ought to run the country; The Times is read by the people who actually do run the country; the Daily Mail is read by the wives of the people who run the country; the Financial Times is read by people who own the country; the Morning Star is read by people who think the country ought to be run by another country, and the Daily Telegraph is read by people who think it is.
Sir Humphrey: Prime Minister, what about the people who read The Sun?
Bernard: Sun readers don't care who runs the country, as long as there’s gloss in it”.
This article attempts to bring under such a Sun “The APMC act” which was conceived with objectives like ensuring that farmers are not exploited by intermediaries. While the purpose is noble, the farmer hasn’t benefitted much. In the current context, the farmer is a hapless beneficiary of the drought or the rain. India owes its debt of gratitude to Nandan Nilekani for conceptualizing the Adhaar and ensuring that each individual rural or urban today understands its value. That value needs to be exploited further. Adhaar can be the metaphorical and mythological Kamdhenu cow!
Aristotle said that, “The whole is greater than the sum of its parts.” We are wondering if instead of creating “One Nation: One market”, we need to look at “All producers on One Portal” APOP, post Covid 19.
The Covid has moved the markets into a period of great turmoil and uncertainty. The transitional journey into the unknown is fraught with risks. Markets run the economy upfront. If we have to see a turn around in the second half, not only markets, but the supply chains that sustain them, also need innovative strategies. As we see a slow lifting of lockdown, we may be expecting a return to normalcy soon. That however, may not happen for the risk of bankruptcies, defaults, and long-term unemployment will be very high. The return to growth will be slow and staggered as well.
The best way to avoid uncertainty is to build predictability! Economy is based on domestic products and imports used to fulfill any shortfalls. Like the classic egg and chicken puzzle, which of the two, production or consumption, is the true driver of economy? Consumption; it is that is the true driver of economy, though it is also equally true that the aim of a good government must be to stimulate production, of bad government is to encourage consumption.
Demand and Consumption determine prices. In contrast the farmer is rendered hapless when growing potatoes or onions and not knowing how many more are growing them that lead to a glut in the market and crashing of potato and onion prices even as the Govt stands mute witness to dumping of them on highways by the farmers in the absence of adequate support prices.
Limited point being that while the consumption statistics and even import statistics may be available, there are no estimates of production of crops other than the major ones.
The answer is locked in Adhaar. It has emerged as the most magnificent idea of a plotted India. It alone can predict production and even pricing.
As a first, if each producer with Adhaar as the id and Postal code as the geographical location were to log in her or his land holding, production and self consumption estimates for the foreseeable future, we could be talking of an AMAZONish” possibility. It would lead to a proactive and much better, robust, sturdy and tenacious supply chain in addition to identifying productive and even cultivable geographies. For the illiterate, the Patwari or the revenue official could assist. The government can then utilize the data to see if it has storage facilities. It can share the data with free markets and encourage the buyers to reach the farms directly using the database.
Next. There is need for a “Cost, Time and Motion effective” supply chain. Evaluation of need gaps to creating effective linkages in that CTM trilogy as the mantra to eradicate poverty, disease and hunger and improving markets through better production, education and health. APOP must become the substance.
How can we deliver potatoes grown in Uttar Pradesh to Tamil Nadu without adequate Reefer or refrigerated containers in place? How is the farmer to predict a bumper or a whimper price for his produce in the absence of any national level estimated production visibility, something that only an APOP can plot.
Only an APOP can help make the supply chain better by letting producers of Uncle Chips know where to source their potatoes at Rs 4/- a kilo to package and sell at Rs 20/- for 50 grams or Rs 400/- per kilo. Only an APOP then will consequently inspire the farmer to demand a better price if the reefer stood at its boundary. Several aggrotech players are already using online marketplace for farmers, where they can sell their produce and get decent returns, even during this hour of crisis. There is need for a consolidated a national portal. APOP is the answer.
Its just a case of APOP linked to “Adhaar” that to our mind, will cure what our earlier policies have failed to endure! More grass can be converted into cheese by bringing in a cow. That silver bullet has even greater power and potential to power the bullet train.
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