End political vendetta; Punjab farmers need nod for crop diversification

The proposal to get into a five-year contract with cooperative institutions appears to be to introduce contract farming from the back door. Contract farming was part of the three contentious laws that were withdrawn. By the time diversification picks up, the contract period will be more or less over

For several years now the talk has been on crop diversification. An impression was being created that because of the assured returns from the dominant wheat-paddy crop rotation, Punjab farmers were reluctant to shift to other crops. As a result, the food bowl of the country encounters serious environmental problems.

The alarming decline in the groundwater level poses serious concern with several studies showing how the plummeting water levels will lead to the fertile tract turning semi-arid in the years to come. Of the 138 development blocks, 108 have already slipped into the ‘dark zone’ meaning that the rate of extraction is higher than 98 per cent in those areas. In many parts, the declining water table has forced farmers to install submersible pumps to draw water from the deep aquifers.

There is no denying that paddy being a water guzzler, Punjab’s underground water resources are under a terrible stress. If that be so, why are farmers continuing with paddy cultivation not seeing the dangers ahead? Is it that farmers are not aware of the dangerous consequences of water mining that they are literally engaged in? Don’t they understand that the speed at which groundwater is being extracted, there will hardly be any water left for the future generations?

These are questions that continue to be asked repeatedly. In fact, political leadership as well as agricultural experts have been grappling with the issue, drawing focus on the need to shift from paddy cultivation if Punjab has to be saved.

After all, paddy requires about 5,000 litres of water for producing one kg of rice. Compared to wheat, the water requirement is about five times more for paddy.

So when protesting Punjab farmers rejected the Centre’s proposal for crop diversification, during the fourth round of talks that three Central Ministers were holding with farmer leaders, eyebrows were raised. While protesting farmer leaders didn’t fall for what is ostensibly seen as a carrot being dangled before them to divert attention from their demand for making Minimum Support Price (MSP) a legal right, many felt that given the crying need for crop diversification farmers should have accepted the offer.

Accordingly, the proposal was for a five-year contract under which the cooperative bodies would procure five crops – tur, urad, masur and maize and cotton – from farmers at the MSP, and buy these crops with no upper limit for procurement. While Union Minister Piyush Goyal called it a ‘very innovative, out-of-the-box idea’, farmers saw it as a diversionary tactic. Moreover, a former Chief Economic Advisor had made a similar proposal a couple of years back. Considering that crop diversification has been talked about ever since the distinguished economist Dr. S. S. Johl presented the first report on crop diversification, a lot of suggestions and even some half-hearted attempts have been made to shift from paddy cultivation.

In any case, despite all the talk of diversifying from paddy, in reality the area under paddy cultivation has reached a record, 31.42-lakh hectares out of the net sown area of 41.17-lakh hectares. This shows that all effort towards diversification so far have come to a naught. Moreover, considering that only one per cent of the area is presently under pulses, and the area and production under cotton is the lowest because of the devastation caused by pest infestation to the genetically modified Bt cotton crop, the proposal to diversify the area under paddy remains rather limited.

Given that the area expected to be diversified is only a small proportion of the net sown area, the proposal to get into a five-year contract with cooperative institutions appears to be to introduce contract farming from the back door. Contract farming was part of the three contentious laws that were withdrawn. By the time diversification picks up, the contract period will be more or less over. Why not instead make Nafed and NCCF to procure the alternative crops the way the Food Corporation of India (FCI) does it for wheat and paddy?

Media reports show that even when there was no concrete proposal, farmers had reluctantly made efforts towards diversification. They understood the need to save the environment but their efforts were thwarted because the market didn’t support them. In the past three years, crops like maize, millets, moong were sold at prices below the MSP announced. For instance, in 2020-21, maize was sold to private players at prices ranging from Rs. 500 to Rs. 1815 per quintal against the MSP of Rs. 1870. Subsequently, maize prices had hovered between Rs. 600 and Rs. 2495 per quintal in 2021-22 and to a maximum of Rs. 2090 in 2023-24.

Similarly, the market prices for arhar had been much lower at Rs. 4920 per quintal against the MSP of Rs. 6300 in 2021-22, and in 2023-24 while the MSP was hiked to Rs. 7000 per quintal; at best the farmers got a price of Rs. 6000 in the market. Bajra too has been sold well below the MSP. Even when the new AAP government encouraged summer moong cultivation to be taken before the paddy crop is sown, more than 90 per cent of the harvest was picked up by the private trade which gave farmers lower prices than the MSP. Later, the State government covered up the losses by deficiency payments.

If only the Centre had earlier offered a definite proposal to procure the alternative crops at MSP and gradually made investment for building adequate infrastructure for post-harvesting, crop diversification would have picked up by now. For several decades now, given that the first report on crop diversification was submitted in early 1980s, dilly-dallying by the Centre is the plausible reason why Punjab farmers didn’t show any inclination to shift the cropping pattern.

Nevertheless, it is baffling to see that while the ongoing farmers protest forced the Centre to come out with a procurement plan for alternative crops, why such a proposal wasn’t made all these years when Punjab wanted to diversify from paddy? Does it not show that the reluctance on the part of the Centre to provide support to Punjab for a much required crop diversification plan hinged on political consideration?

Having said that, there have been years when faced with dwindling rice procurement at the national level, the Centre had asked Punjab to focus on increasing paddy production. Punjab had even asked for the same credit limit that is offered for paddy procurement, to be given to the State allowing it to use it for procuring alternate crops at an assured price.

The failure to diversify shouldn’t be seen through a narrow prism of treating it as Punjab’s loss, it is more importantly a national loss. It is therefore quite clear that keeping politics aside, crop diversification in Punjab requires both the Centre and the State to make a concerted effort jointly.

(The author is a noted food policy analyst and an expert on issues related to the agriculture sector. He writes on food, agriculture and hunger)