By Elsa Maria Joseph
India is progressingachieving heights of globalisation and a good GDP growth rate. However, it is also achieving and an ever-increasing number of farmer suicides. Farmer suicides in the country rose by 42% between 2014 and 2015, according to newly-released data from the National Crime Records Bureau in states such as Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Tamil Nadu, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Orissa and Jharkhand.
Why are Indian farmers committing suicide?
India is an agrarian economy. It has had a Green Revolution and various schemes such as Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojana and the National Food Security Mission to create subsidies for farmers. What, then, could possibly drive so many farmers to such an extreme step?
Various reasons have been offered to explain why farmers commit suicide in India: calamities, debt stress and family responsibility. The use of genetically modified seeds and low quantities pesticides due to fewer investments produce a decreased yield. Government economic policies, which increasingly disfavour the agricultural sector, are another cause.
Kerala’s fight for food security
Move down a bit to the south, to the lush green state of Kerala. This state too was food deficit once. One of the major forces acting against this deficiency was the ‘Kudumbashree’. Kudumbashree was originally launched in 1998 to eradicate poverty through community action under the leadership of Local Self Governments. This all-women network has helped revive the matriarchal legacy of Kerala by making women independent. But more importantly, it has led to the betterment of the state as a whole.
In a move towards food security, Kudumbashree took up ‘collective farming’. This involves cultivation of fallow farmland taken on informal lease by groups of women with the support of Panchayats and the Kudumbashree community network. Kudumbashree brought in NABARDs (National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development) concept of joint liability groups (JLGs). This resulted in making NABARDs scheme of interest subsidy available to groups engaged in collective farming. The step reduced the interest rate of farm loans effectively to 2%, as NABARD provided 5% interest subsidy on loans taken by JLGs at 7% interest rate. These resource-poor rural women brought more than 2 lakh acres of fallow land into agriculture.
Empowering women to save agriculture
The Kudumbashree district mission then launched Harithasree, a project to promote organic farming. A ‘master farmer programme’ has also been rolled out to impart expert training to women farmers. Under the programme, more than 10,000 experienced women farmers have been roped in from each panchayat after screening and trained as ‘Master Farmers’. This can help farmers at grassroots as native people know their land and their people the best. This will ensure effective communication as well.
Moreover, measures like seed banking and soil testing facility have been launched. Credit flow has been ensured by linking the JLGs with the bank to promote agriculture. Such ease of credit flow is much better than ten different subsidies and is certainly an answer to cut throat interest rates by landlords. Marketing facilities have also been provided through the creation of weekly and monthly markets and organising trade fairs. This will eliminate the role of middlemen by making the market accessible to the farmer.
Such simple yet well-implemented measures brought Kerala out of food deficit with only the female population working in farms.
Inspiration for other states
The problems faced by farmers in other states such as Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh too can be solved; not with loan waivers or more subsidies, but by forming groups such as Kudumbashree to get the maximum yield from land. This will bring together the land which is getting divided into smaller and smaller patches due to inheritance laws. It will also help reduce incidents of NPAs (Non-Performing Assets) for banks.
Women are in disguised unemployment in the northern agrarian states. The formation of such groups will make women independent. Further, if it includes their farmer husbands, the results shall be better than that of Kerala.
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