Lok Sabha Question No. 337 (UNSTARRED), answered on 2023-12-05
Subject: Reduction of Funds under PMFBY
Ministry: AGRICULTURE AND FARMERS WELFARE
Asked by: Faizal P.P. Mohammed

## GOVERNMENT OF INDIA MINISTRY OF AGRICULTURE AND FARMERS WELFARE

## DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE AND FARMERS WELFARE

## LOK SABHA

## UNSTARRED QUESTION NO. 337

TO BE ANSWERED ON THE 5 TH  DECEMBER, 2023

## REDUCTION OF FUNDS UNDER PMFBY

337. SHRI MOHAMMED FAIZAL P.P.:

Will the Minister of AGRICULTURE AND FARMERS WELFARE कृ ͪष एवं ͩकसान कãयाण मंğी be pleased to state:

- (a) whether the Government has reduced the allocation under the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) from 15500 crore in BE 2022-23 to 13625 crore in BE 2023-24; and
- (b) the measures which the Government is taking to improve the claim settlement rate under the said Yojana?

## ANSWER

## MINISTER OF AGRICULTURE AND FARMERS WELFARE

कृ ͪष एवं ͩकसान कãयाण मंğी (SHRI NARENDRA SINGH TOMAR)

- (a) : Payment of premium share as per the provisions of the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) is the committed liability of the Government and sufficient budget provision is made accordingly.  In fact the budget of the scheme has been increased to Rs. 15,000/- crore at  Revised  Estimates (RE) stage in current financial year i.e.  2023-24 as compared to Rs. 12,375.76 crore in RE 2022-23.
- (b)  :  Though  timelines  for  each  activity  including  settlement  of  claims  are  provided  in  the Operational Guidelines of PMFBY, settlement of few claims in some States may at times be slightly delayed due to reasons like delayed transmission of yield data,   late release of State share in premium subsidy by the States, yield related disputes between insurance companies and States, non-receipt of account details of some farmers for transfer of claims to the bank account  of  eligible  farmers,    National  Electronic  Fund  Transfer  (NEFT)  related  issues, erroneous/incomplete  entry  of  individual  farmers  data  on  National  Crop  Insurance  Portal (NCIP), delay in remittance of farmers share of premium/non-remittance of farmers share of premium to  concerned insurance company  etc.     Government has taken  various steps to increase the claim settlement rate under the scheme.  This Department is regularly monitoring the  implementation  of  PMFBY  including  timely  settlement  of  claims  through  weekly  video conference  of  stakeholders,  one  to  one  meetings  with  insurance  companies/States  etc. Various innovative technologies are also adopted to increase the timeliness for flow of requisite information/data amongst stakeholders.

Also, towards leveraging technology, various steps have been taken like capturing of yield data/Crop Cutting Experiments (CCEs) data through CCE-Agri App & uploading it on the NCIP, allowing insurance companies to witness the conduct of CCEs, integration of State land records with NCIP etc. have already been taken to improve timely settlement of the claims to farmers.   Following  technologies  for  Objective  Crop  Damage  &  Loss  Assessment  and transparency have also been approved recently for implementation w.e.f. 2023-24 :

-  YES-TECH (Yield Estimation System Based on Technology) for gradual migration to Remote-Sensing  based  yield  estimation  to  help  assess  yields  as  well  as  fair  and accurate Crop Yield Estimation . This initiative has been launched for paddy & wheat crops from Kharif 2023 wherein 30% weightage to yield estimation will mandatorily be assigned to YES-TECH derived yield.
-  WINDS (Weather  Information  Network  and  Data  System)  for  Network  of  Automatic Weather Stations  (AWS) &  Automatic  Rain-Gauges  (ARG)  for  collecting  hyper-local weather data at GP & Block level.  This will be fed into a National unified network of AWS  &  ARG  with  interoperability  &  sharing  of  data  in  coordination  with  India Meteorological Department (IMD).  WINDS will provide data not only for YES-TECH but also  for  effective  drought  &  disaster  management,  accurate  weather  prediction  and offering better parametric insurance products.
-  CROPIC (Collection of Real-time photos and Observations of Crops) for Geo-tagged photographs for validation of sown Crop with Insured Crop and use of pictorial analytics for Objective Crop Damage Assessment & Crop Yield Estimation.

In  order to rigorously monitor claim disbursal process an end to end module namely 'Digiclaim Module' has been operationalized for payment of claims from Kharif 2022 onwards. It  involves  integration  of  National  Crop  Insurance  Portal  (NCIP)  with  Public  Finance Management  System  (PFMS)  and  accounting  system  of  Insurance  Companies  to  provide timely & transparent processing of all claims.

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