BW Communities

Agriculture India-For the Farmer-Big or Small

Vidur Sahgal Jun 05, 2020

There are 664369 villages in India as of 2020. Out of these inhabited villages in the country, the largest number of villages (145000) is in the population (See Figure 1 below) size group of 500-999 persons, followed by the groups 100-1999 (130000) and 200-499 (128000). There are 3,961 villages, which have a population of 10,000 persons or more. Many population clusters, due to the different qualification definitions to be a rural or urban village, lose out on benefits for “Village’s”. I feel that if 50-75% of the land area outlined to a village is used for agriculture, horticulture & livestock as also fishing & aquaculture, the population cluster should be called a village, & should qualify as a village irrespective of the population size. The population of rural India is estimated to be 700 million.

Once the definition of a village is agreed upon, then adequate resources, means & ends should be provided to The Village Panchayat. All the land holdings should be consolidated as one farm and should be managed & farmed as one farm by the elected Panchayat. The entire landholding of the village should be partitioned as per soil quality, irrigation facilities, location and size and the farm landowner should be given equity in the overall cooperative so as to enjoy kind & cash returns that will be earned by the “Village Farm” according to his/her equity share.\

Resources, Means & Ends that should be provided to the Panchayat for the Cooperative One Village Farm:-

Plastic Drip Water Irrigation system for the entire One Village Farm (OVF).
Plastic pipeline door to door clean water supply for human usage for the entire OVF.
Plastic pipeline based sewage systems. Mini waste disposal systems.
All mechanized harvesting & sowing farm equipment including tractors.
Solar Pumps, solar cookers & solar lights/Coolers/fans.
Agricultural producing warehousing facilities to every village farm. Size-dependent on total produce of entire village farm.
Adequate Organic manure & Compost. All village farms to move away from petrochemical-based fertilizers by 2025.
Landless labour in Village to be given priority in personnel required to work the Village Farm, with a regulated minimum wage. Remaining village population could be allowed to work in urban areas, if required, but must possess a Village Panchayat Permission to work outside the village. Exceptions would be NREGA & MGNREGA.
Hardware, Software, telecommunications & adequate speed internet facilities depending on the population size of the village. To be connected to the One Nation One Agriculture Market as well as One Nation One Portable PDS Ration, besides others.
An online education system & set up with schooling compulsory up to Class 12 totally free of cost to all students including stationery, laptops, smartphones, uniforms, Kindle textbooks up to the age of 20 years. If students want to study further they should be allowed to free of cost near their village location. In fact, studies should be treated as a “job” with R & D as the ROI, and institutes of higher learning as “Factories” of educated & innovative entrepreneurs along with employees. Vocational skills should also be encouraged.
Family planning with the oldest 2 children in a family will be given all facilities including the right to vote. Cut off-year from when this will become valid from to be decided based on demographic data. Only planned children will be allowed to be given birth to. No “lust children” anymore!
Wherever possible the Village Panchayat should gradually give way from the elderly to the educated elderly with the uneducated elderly remaining as consultants to the Panchayat. There should be educated & knowledgeable personnel in all aspects of village economics, right from teachers, agriculture advisers, accountants, as well as agro produce brokers and marketers.
The government should also increase its efforts in providing an agro-produce logistics department which directs produce from the farmer straight to the actual consumer where both enjoy higher & lower prices respectively, besides good quality. There has been done quite a lot of work in this aspect but it should go all the way. For example, from “Mother Diary” shops in Delhi to individual licensed Thelawalas & market agro-produce shops/outlets. The farmer should know the prices of his produce that he will get before he sets of with his load of agro-produce & Fair retail Prices should be displayed by individual Thelawalas & shops. Maybe there should be an App mentioning current prices in real-time at the farmer’s gate, wholesale market rate, as well as rates of the retailers at all these locations. This App must be maintained by the Agriculture Ministry.

Most of what has been mentioned above may already being done in villages, but the objective of this article is to let the educated & urbanite know that villages could be fun also to study & work in, and the potential of being markets for various goods, products & services should not be underestimated.

Remember, the village is mostly where most of the food that the nation eats is produced, and one can live without Cars & TVs etc but one cannot live without food. Our farmers take their loans very seriously but these loans must be insured & loaded towards the farmers or the OVF’s side. Vested interests have not allowed the OVFs to crystallize into a national movement but must be encouraged if “Self Reliant India” is the objective, and should cover pan India by 2024.

50% (26 crores) of the working population of India approximately work in agriculture where their contribution is about 17% to the GDP. With OVFs spread all over India, this low productivity will be a thing of the past. One by one as OVFs get established and become self-reliant, so too will India.

See Figure 1 below:-

India’s Population & Distribution Of Settlements