Lok Sabha Question No. 196 (STARRED), answered on 2023-03-14
Subject: Doubling of Farmers' Income
Ministry: AGRICULTURE AND FARMERS WELFARE
Asked by: Rahul Kaswan

## GOVERNMENT OF INDIA MINISTRY OF AGRICULTURE AND FARMERS WELFARE DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE AND FARMERS WELFARE

## LOK SABHA STARRED QUESTION NO. 196

TO BE ANSWERED ON 14 TH  MARCH, 2023

## DOUBLING OF FARMERS' INCOME

*196.   SHRI RAHUL KASWAN:

Will the Minister of AGRICULTURE AND FARMERS WELFARE कृ िष एवं कसान कयाण मंी be pleased to State?

- (a) whether the Government has launched new initiatives, schemes, programmes and yojanas to benefit the farmers and if so, the details thereof; (b) whether  the  Government  has  reviewed  the  performance  of  the  schemes implemented to double the income of farmers by the year 2022 and if so, the details thereof; (c) whether the Government proposes to remove the obstacles hindering the doubling of farmers' income; (d) the extent to which the said initiatives, schemes, programmes and yojanas have improved the quality of life of farmers, particularly small and marginal farmers; the role of the Union and State Governments in implementing the said initiatives, schemes, programmes and yojanas for the welfare of farmers with unirrigated land in
- (e) Rajasthan; and
- (f) the kind of assistance provided for effective implementation of the said schemes?

## ANSWER

MINISTRY OF AGRICULTURE AND FARMERS WELFARE कृ िष एवं कसान कयाण मंी (SHRI NARENDRA SINGH TOMAR) (a) to (f):     A statement is laid on the table of the House.

## STATEMENT  REFERRED  TO  IN  REPLY  TO  PART  (a)  to  (f)  OF  LOK  SABHA STARRED QUESTION NO. 196 DUE FOR ANSWER ON 14 th  MARCH, 2022.

(a) to (d): Agriculture is a state subject. The Government of India is committed to the welfare of farmers. It has launched various central sector and centrally sponsored schemes from time to time covering entire spectrum of agriculture in order to ensure welfare of farmers including small and marginal farmers in the country. Apart from the schemes, Government of India has also taken several initiatives to enhance income and improve quality of life of farmers. In this regard, Government had constituted an Inter-Ministerial Committee in April, 2016 to examine issues relating to 'Doubling of Farmers  Income  (DFI)'  and  recommended  strategies  to  achieve  the  same.    The Committee submitted its final report to the Government in September, 2018 containing the  strategy  for  doubling  of  farmers'  income  through  various  policies,  reforms  & programmes. To achieve the objective, the Committee identified seven sources of income growth;

- i. Increase in crop productivity
- ii. Increase in livestock productivity
- iii. Resource use efficiency - reduction in cost of production
- iv. Increase in cropping intensity
- v. Diversification to high value agriculture
- vi. Remunerative prices on farmers' produce
- vii. Shift of surplus manpower from farm to non-farm occupations

## Unprecedented Growth in Agriculture Budget

In  line  with  the  strategy,  Government  has  adopted/implemented  several developmental  programmes,  schemes,  reforms  and  policies  for  achieving  higher incomes for the farmers. There has been an unprecedented enhancement in budget allocation since 2013-14. In the year 2013-14 the Budget Estimate (BE) of Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers' Welfare was only Rs 27,662.67 crore. This has increased by more than 4.52 time to Rs 125035.79 crore in 2023-24.

## Record Production in Food and Horticulture

Food grain production has increased from 265.05 million tonnes in 2013-14 to record 323.55 million tonnes in 2022-23 (as per 2nd advance estimates) which is the highest ever food grain production. The horticulture production was 342.33 million MTs which is highest ever for Indian Horticulture.

## Growth in Export of Agricultural commodities

The  country  has  witnessed  emphatic  growth  in  export  of  agri  and  allied commodities. Agri and allied export has increased from 41.86 billion USD in 2020-21 to 50.24 billion USD in 2021-22 i.e. an increase of 19.99%.

## Increase in Minimum Support Price

Government has increased the MSP for all mandated Kharif, Rabi and other commercial crops with a return of at least 50 per cent over all India weighted average cost of production from 2018-19. MSP for Paddy (common) has increased to Rs. 2040 per quintal in 2022-23 from Rs. 1310 per quintal in 2013-14. MSP for Wheat increased from Rs. 1400 per quintal in 2013-14 to Rs. 2125 per quintal in 2022-23. Also there has been an increase in procurement from farmers.

## Income support and Risk Cover

PM-KISAN provides income support to farmers. Since its launch, more than Rs. 2.41 lakh crore has been released to more than 11 crore farmers. Pradhan Mantri Fasal  Bima  Yojana  (PMFBY)  was  launched  in  2016  addressing  problems  of  high premium rates for farmers and reduction in sum insured due to capping. In past 6 Years  of  implementation,  37.66  crore  farmer  applications  enrolled  and  over  12.38 crore farmer applicants have received claims of over Rs. 1,30,185 crore.

## Institutional Credit for Agriculture Sector

Institutional credit for agriculture sector is increased from Rs. 7.3 lakh crore in 2013-14 with a target to reach Rs. 18.5 lakh crore in 2022-23. Benefit of concessional institutional credit through KCC at 4% interest per annum has also now been extended to  Animal  Husbandry  and  Fisheries  farmers  for  meeting  their  short-term  working capital needs.

A  special  drive  has  been  undertaken  since  February  2020  to  provide concessional institutional credit  with  focus  on  covering  all  PM-KISAN  beneficiaries through  Kisan  Credit  Cards  (KCC).  As  on  24.02.2023,  400.09  lakh  new  KCC applications have been sanctioned with a sanctioned credit limit of Rs. 4,69,989 crore as part of the drive.

## Promotion of Organic Farming

The schemes Paramparagat Krishi Vikas Yojana (PKVY) and Mission Organic Value  Chain  Development  for  North  Eastern  Region  (MOVCDNER)  cater  to  the promotion of organic farming in the country. Under PKVY Scheme 32,384 clusters (20 ha  each)  formed,  6.53  lakh  ha  area  covered  and  16.19  lakh  farmers  have  been benefitted.

GoI has already initiated Natural Farming through implementation of Bhartiya Prakritic Krishi Padhati (BPKP- a sub scheme of PKVY) since 2020-21. A total of 4.09 lakh ha area has already been covered in 8 States under BPKP. The BPKP scheme is  being  up  scaled  in  Mission  Mode  as  a  separate  as  National  Mission  on  Natural Farming to cover 7.5 lakh ha area by developing 15000 clusters. Under Mission for Integrated  Development  of  Horticulture  (MIDH),  scheme  for  holistic  growth  of  the horticulture sector, an additional area of 12.16 lakh ha. of identified horticulture crops has been covered.

## Agricultural Infrastructure Fund

In order to mobilize a medium - long term debt financing facility for investment in agri Infrastructure, Agriculture Infrastructure Fund (AIF) of Rs one lakh crore was launched in 2020. All loans under this financing facility have interest subvention of 3% per annum up to a limit of 2 crore.

## Promotion of FPOs

The Government of India has launched the Central Sector Scheme (CSS) for 'Formation and Promotion of 10,000 Farmer Producer Organizations (FPOs)' in the year 2020. 4676 FPOs have been registered under the scheme so far.  A National Beekeeping and Honey Mission (NBHM) has been launched in 2020 as part of the Atma Nirbhar Bharat Abhiyan. Rs. 500 crores for the period 2020-2021 to 2022-2023 has been allocated for beekeeping sector.

## Per Drop More Crop (PDMC)

In  order  to  increase  water  use  efficiency  at  the  farm  level  through  Micro Irrigation technologies i.e. drip and sprinkler irrigation systems, Per Drop More Crop (PDMC) scheme was launched during 2015-16. An area of 72.24 lakh hectare has been  covered  under  Micro  irrigation  through  the  PDMC  scheme  since  2015-16. Moreover, a Micro Irrigation Fund (MIF) of initial corpus Rs 5000 crore was created with NABARD.  In the Budget Announcement for 2021-22, the corpus of the fund was increased to Rs.10000 crores.

## Promotion of Drone Technology in Agriculture

Looking  into  the  unique  advantages  of  drone  technologies  in  agriculture,  a Standard Operating Procedures  (SOPs) has  been  released.  In  order  to  make  this technology affordable to the farmers and other stakeholders of this sector, financial assistance @ 100 % cost of drone together with the contingent expenditure is provided for its  demonstration on the farmers' fields. So far an amount of Rs. 124.43 crores have been released towards Kisan drone promotion.

## Setting up E-NAM extension platform

Government  has  set  up  a  National  Agriculture  Market  (eNAM),  a  pan-India electronic trading portal which networks the existing APMC mandis to create a unified national market for agricultural commodities. 1260 mandis of 22 States and 03 UTs have been integrated to e-NAM platform and more than 1.74 Crore Farmers & 2.39 Lakh traders have been registered on e-NAM portal.

## Agri Startups

Under RKVY Agri-startup Programme, during FY 2019-20 to 2022-23, 1138 Start-ups have  been  selected  and Rs.  69.24  crore  released  as  grants-in-aid  for funding these Start-ups.

## International Year of Millets

Since  the  declaration  of  the  International  Year  of  Millets  (IYM)  2023  by  the UNGA in 2021, Government has taken a proactive multi  stakeholder engagement approach to achieve the aim of IYM 2023 and taking Indian millets globally.  In order to investigate the gaps  and  challenges across the millets value chain  and implementation of suitable solutions, 6 task forces were constituted.  Also, 25 seedhubs have been established to ensure availability of quality seed of latest improved varieties of Nutri cereals in the country. Millet missions have been launched across 5 states including Odisha, Tamil Nadu, Chhattisgarh, Assam, Karnataka. More than 500 start-ups  and  350  FPOs  have  been  established  and  are  operational  in  the  millet ecosystem as of now.

## Review and Monitoring

In  order  to  improve  transparency  and  ease  of  living  of  farmers  the  use  of technology is incorporated in the schemes such as PMKISAN and PMFBY, the cluster based approach is promoted in the schemes such as NFSM and MIDH, value chain development is promoted through FPOs and participation of agri startups etc. Effective implementation of schemes is also ensured through measures such as setting up of Benefit

Project Management  Units, Management  Information Systems, Direct Transfer, aadhar authentication of beneficiary data, validation through PFMS etc. Government  is  also  building  up  digital  agriculture  ecosystem,  agristack,  for better planning, monitoring, policy making, strategy formulation and smooth implementation of schemes. The components include core registries, base databases, farmers'  database,  linking  farmers'  ID  linked  with  land  records,  geo-referencing  of plots,  crop  survey,  crop  planning  and  soil  mapping,  soil  fertility,  Unified  Farmers Service Interface for state, private players and data exchange. The efforts of Government at positive implementation of these schemes have yielded remarkable results towards augmenting the income of the farmers. As part of the 'Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav', Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) has released a book, which contains compilation of success stories of 75,000 farmers out of innumerable successful farmers who have increased their income more than two times. (e)  &  (f)  The  Union  and  state  governments  are  working  in  close  coordination  in planning  and  implementation  of  the  schemes  of  Government  of  India  and  state governments  to  ensure  that  intended  benefits  of  the  schemes  are  reaching  the farmers. Various kinds of assistance are provided to the farmers in different schemes. A brief on major schemes implemented by the Government of India for the welfare of farmers  with  unirrigated  land  including  the  state  of  Rajasthan  is  given  in  the

Annexure- I .

## Annexure- I

## Major schemes implemented for the welfare of farmers with unirrigated land

1. Rainfed Area Development (RAD) is being implemented from 2014-15 in the country. Since 2014-15 to 2022-23 till date, Rs 1580.98 crore has been released to all states including Rs 34.39 crore for Rajasthan. The area covered under the scheme during this period is 6.94 lakh ha. out of which 0.184 lakh ha is in Rajasthan.

## 2. Per Drop More Crop Scheme (PDMC)

Centrally Sponsored Scheme of Per Drop More Crop (PDMC) is implemented in the country from 2015-16. The PDMC focuses on enhancing water use efficiency at farm  level  through  Micro  Irrigation  viz  Drip  and  Sprinkler  Irrigation  Systems.  Since 2015-16  to  2022-23  till  date,  Rs  17963.77  crore  has  been  released  to  all  states including Rs 1108.82 crore for Rajasthan. The area covered under the scheme during this period is 74.52 lakh ha. out of which 5.35 lakh ha is in Rajasthan.

## 3. Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana (PMKSY)

Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana (PMKSY) was launched during the year 2015-16, with an aim to enhance physical access of water on farm and expand cultivable  area  under  assured  irrigation,  improve  on-farm  water  use  efficiency, introduce sustainable water conservation practices, etc. Since 2015-16 to 2021-22, Rs 13754.01  crore  has  been  released  to  all  states  including  Rs  458.56  crore  for Rajasthan. The Irrigation Potential Created under the scheme during this period is 2447.37 thousand ha. out of which 7.24 thousand ha is in Rajasthan.

The extension of PMKSY for the period 2021-22 to 2025-26 has been approved by  Government  of  India,  with  an  overall  outlay  of  Rs.  93,068.56  crore  (central assistance of Rs. 37,454 crore, debt servicing to NABARD for Rs. 20,434.56 crore and an outlay for Rs. 35,180 crore by the State Governments towards State share).

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