Power to the Small Farmer

The Calculus of Small Farmer Agriculture

During the recently concluded International Seminar on Democracy, Socialism and Visions for the 21^st Century, in Hyderabad, several eminent speakers highlighted issues key to the future development of the newly-formed Telangana State in India. Dr. CH Hanumantha Rao emphasized that 90% of the state’s population was composed of poor tribal, Dalit, and backward caste communities. Dr. Prabhat Patnaik clarified that neo-liberal economics under capitalism had no help to offer small producers and even its so-called welfare schemes acted against their interests. Prof. Kodandram said the struggle he led had been only between the poor of Telangana and their exploiters, the crony capitalists and contractors of the region. Hence, it is time a new pro-poor economic policy should be formulated for the people of the state.

The bulk of the Telangana population is composed of poor, small and marginal farmers, failing to eke sustainable livelihoods through dryland agriculture. In the recent past several thousands have committed suicide. The government’s desultory policy of occasionally throwing some relief their way in the form of ‘loan mafi’[write-off] has only made banks even more determined not to provide credit to poor farmers. The farmers are in the grip of dealers, who in exchange for giving them much needed crop loans thrust on them cocktails of pesticides and other harmful chemicals. Their soils have lost most of their fertility containing only a tenth or less of organic carbon content. Despite the fact that Telangana contains two-thirds of the catchment areas of the two great rivers, Krishna and Godavari, few have access to assured irrigation. Water from traditional tanks has shrunk to less than half, and poor farmers cannot afford deep borewells, and even these are drying up year by year. Around 40% of cultivable land is lying fallow. When farmers achieve a good harvest thanks to the monsoon arriving on time once in a while, the lack of market tie-ups leads to great wastage of fruits and vegetables, and depressed prices for grain. The government’s focus on procurement of the main cereals has also led to reduced growing of the cheaper and more nutritious millets.

Conventional planning wisdom has suggested corporatization of agriculture; attracting rural populations away from drylands to cities; vastly expensive lift irrigation and surface water projects; and the setting up of industries in rural areas. Corporatization has met with political resistance; distress migration from villages has only created vast urban slums; expensive irrigation projects while benefiting contractors have produced only marginal benefits in productivity; and industries have failed to soak up available surplus labour.

 However, if grandiose money-making plans are set aside, and the focus is placed on what needs to be done step by step to help the small farmer communities, the situation presents many workable and affordable solutions. Several small tributaries of the great rivers crisscross Telangana.  Dr. T. Hanumantha Rao, one of the world’s great irrigation experts, has proved through his colourfully titled ‘Four Waters’ concept that micro- watersheds can quickly increase productivity of land, provided they are designed to integrate minor irrigation engineering with sound agricultural, and silvi-cultural practices. Telangana’s countryside is still home to sizable herds of sheep and goats, though it is not home to a tanning industry. Corralling animal herds on land after harvest used to be a common practice, and its revival along with growing a vetch to cover soil can quickly increase soil fertility. ICAR has recognized for over a decade that for drylands the focus should be on farming communities and ‘group action technologies,’ and not on the individual farmer. Under the guidance of the FAO, farmer field school practices have been developed, along with integrated pest and nutrient management techniques.

The government guided by its economists has long recognized that industries require supportive infrastructure, but it has failed to see that sustainable agriculture requires infrastructural support as well, proper warehouses and cold storage, transport, and market linkages. Small farmers are perhaps among the most enterprising of India’s entrepreneurs and require unhindered access to bank financing. They deserve a network of micro-finance institutions and banking correspondents. Active producer associations of small farmers need organization to rationalize regional crop production and profitable marketing. Internet-based communication between farmer and market is now a real possibility. Affordable administration of all this requires transfer of power and finance to the Panchayat Raj Institutions [village bodies] created by the 73^rd amendment to the Constitution, and they should also be entrusted with monitoring progress through established participative rural appraisal methods.

Dr. MS Swaminathan has long called for a ‘brown revolution.’ If the new Telangana government makes it a priority to increase small farmer productivity, the state may soon witness a doubling of food production, sustainable farmer incomes, affordable consumer prices, and food security and improved health among its poor. The calculus of such a grassroots approach to sustainable agricultural development produces an integration of millions of small farmer successes for national growth, founded on a bedrock of rural wealth, increasing consumer power, and future investment possibilities.