Union Cabinet May Further Discuss Proposed Ammendments In Agriculture Sector

Union Cabinet can be expected to discuss issues impacting the agricultural sector including the proposed changes to the  APMC Act, Model Contract Farming Act and the Essential Commodities Act in its meeting scheduled for June 3 say sources in the government.

On June 2 PM Narendra Modi talked about important changes being made on APMC Act in his address to CII. While PM had asked industrialists to come forward for development of proposed agricultural clusters, he had also touched upon various key issues in Indian agriculture and allied sectors.

On the other hand National Bulk Handling Corporation (NBHC) has come out with final estimates for Rabi harvesting for year 2019-20 with not so good projections.

Under major commodities, for instance, pulses and oil seed have marginally pushed themselves further in the negative region with an expected decline of 4.58 per cent and 6.58 per cent over the last estimate.

The wheat production hasn't bring good news either and is expected to fall further by 3.12 per cent over last estimate, as delayed harvesting has led to a fall in yield and further delays in procurement exposes the crop to untimely rains but would be still higher by 5.61 per cent over last year.

The only good news is from rice production that is expected to increase marginally by 3.17 per cent, over last estimate amidst reports of higher yield in Telangana but would still be lower by 25.67 per cent over last year owing to marginal shift in farmer’s focus to pulses & wheat.

Farmer union leaders like Pushpender Singh from Kisan Shakti Sangh are still blaming the government to serve the old commitments in new form. As per Singh, the most serious demand that could have given immediate relief to farmers, was a hike in PM-KISAN amount. Singh said that most of the announcements by union government will bring long term results and the major setback to farmers can only be healed by immediate assistance.