Date: 15/11/2020 Shift: 3:00 PM – 5:00 PM Q. No: 48

The stark observation made in the Economic Survey of 2015-16 that “Indian agriculture, is in a way, a victim of its own past success – especially the green revolution”, shows the dark reality of the agriculture sector at present and the havoc that has been wreaked by the green revolution.
The green revolution, which is often characterised by the introduction of high-yielding variety of seeds and fertilisers, undoubtedly increased the productivity of land considerably. But the growth in the productivity has been stagnant in recent years, resulting in a significant decline in the income of farmers. There have also been negative environmental effects in the form of depleting water table, emission of greenhouse gases, and the contamination of surface and ground water. Needless to say, the agriculture sector is in a state of distress, which is severely affecting peasants and marginal farmers, and urgent policy interventions are required to protect their interests.
The government has responded to the problem by constituting a panel, which will recommend ways to double the income of farmers by 2022. While this may be an overtly ambitious target, if we want to boost stagnated agricultural growth a shift has to be made from food security of the nation to income security of the farmers. However, there are many hurdles that have to be crossed if we want to achieve this objective.
The first major barrier to overcome is declining productivity. Data from 2013 reveals that India’s average yield of cereal per hectare is far less than that of many countries (including several low income countries), but the difference is huge when compared to China. For instance, our average yield per hectare is 39% below than that of China and for rice this figure is 46%. Even Bangladesh, Vietnam and Indonesia fare better than India in case of rice yield. Further, there is a huge inter-regional variation; the wheat and rice yield from Haryana and Punjab is much higher than from the other states.
In order to cross the declining productivity barrier there is a need to herald a rainbow revolution by making a shift from wheat-rice cycle to other cereals and pulses. Since wheat and rice coupled with other crops are backed by minimum support prices (MSP) and input subsidy (whether water, fertiliser or power) regime, there is a huge incentive for the farmers in the irrigated region of Northwest India to grow these crops.