Swaminathan Report: National Commission on

Farmers

The National Commission on Farmers, chaired by Prof. M. S. Swaminathan, submitted five

reports through the period December 2004 - October 2006. Following from the first four, the
final report focused on causes of famer distresses and the rise in farmer suicides, and
recommends addressing them through a holistic national policy for farmers. The findings and
recommendations encompass issues of access to resources and social security entitlements.
This summary is a quick reference point highlighting the key findings and policy
recommendations under land reforms, irrigation, credit and insurance,
food security, employment, productivity of agriculture and farmer
competitiveness.

Background
The National Commission on Farmers (NCF) was constituted on November 18, 2004 under
the chairmanship of Professor M.S. Swaminathan. The Terms of Reference reflected the
priorities listed in the Common Minimum Programme. The NCF submitted four reports in
December 2004, August 2005, December 2005 and April 2006 respectively. The fifth and
final report was submitted on October 4, 2006. The reports contain suggestions to achieve
the goal of "faster and more inclusive growth" as envisaged in the Approach to 11th Five Year
Plan.
Terms of Reference
The NCF is mandated to make suggestions on issues such as:

a medium-term strategy for food and nutrition security in the country in order to
move towards the goal of universal food security over time;

enhancing productivity, profitability, and sustainability of the major farming systems

of the country;

policy reforms to substantially increase flow of rural credit to all farmers;

special programmes for dryland farming for farmers in the arid and semi-arid regions,

as well as for farmers in hilly and coastal areas;

enhancing the quality and cost competitiveness of farm commodities so as to make

them globally competitive;

protecting farmers from imports when international prices fall sharply;

empowering elected local bodies to effectively conserve and improve the ecological
foundations for sustainable agriculture;

Key Findings and Recommendations

Causes for farmers' distress
Agrarian distress has led farmers to commit suicide in recent years. The major causes of the
agrarian crisis are: unfinished agenda in land reform, quantity and quality of water,
technology fatigue, access, adequacy and timeliness of institutional credit, and opportunities
for assured and remunerative marketing. Adverse meteorological factors add to these
problems.
Farmers need to have assured access and control over basic resources, which include land,
water, bioresources, credit and insurance, technology and knowledge management, and
markets. The NCF recommends that "Agriculture" be inserted in the Concurrent List of the
Constitution.
Land Reforms
Land reforms are necessary to address the basic issue of access to land for both crops and
livestock. Land holdings inequality is reflected in land ownership. In 1991-92, the share of
the bottom half of the rural households in the total land ownership was only 3% and the top
10% was as high as 54%.
Table 1: Distribution of Land
Land Holding

% of House holds

% of Land hold

Land less

11.24

Sub-margin holdings (0.01 - 0.99 acres)

40.11

3.80

Marginal holdings (1.00 - 2.49 acres)

20.52

13.13

Small holdings (2.50 - 4.99 acres)

13.42

18.59

Medium holdings (5 - 14.99 acres)

12.09

37.81

Large holdings (15 acres + above)

2.62

26.67

100.0
100.0
Source: Table 1 of the Fifth NCF Report based on Some Aspects of Household Ownership
Landholdings-1991-92. NSS Report-399

Some of the main recommendations include:

Distribute ceiling-surplus and waste lands;

Prevent diversion of prime agricultural land and forest to corporate sector for nonagricultural purposes.

Ensure grazing rights and seasonal access to forests to tribals and pastoralists, and
access to common property resources.

Establish a National Land Use Advisory Service, which would have the capacity to
link land use decisions with ecological meteorological and marketing factors on a
location and season specific basis.

Set up a mechanism to regulate the sale of agricultural land, based on quantum of

land, nature of proposed use and category of buyer.

Irrigation
Out of the gross sown area of 192 million ha, rainfed agriculture contributes to 60 per cent of
the gross cropped area and 45 per cent of the total agricultural output. The report
recommends:

A comprehensive set of reforms to enable farmers to have sustained and equitable

access to water.

Increase water supply through rainwater harvesting and recharge of the aquifer
should become mandatory. "Million Wells Recharge" programme, specifically
targeted at private wells should be launched.

Substantial increase in investment in irrigation sector under the 11th Five Year Plan
apportioned between large surface water systems; minor irrigation and new schemes
for groundwater recharge.

Productivity of Agriculture
Apart from the size of holding, the productivity levels primarily determine the income of the
farmers. However, the per unit area productivity of Indian agriculture is much lower than
other major crop producing countries.
Table 2: Comparative Yield of Select Crops in Various Countries (Kg/ha)
Country

Crop
Paddy

Wheat

Maize

Groundnut

Sugarcane

India

2929

2583

1667

913

68012

China

6321

3969

4880

2799

85294

Japan

6414

2336

SA

6622

2872

8398

3038

80787

Indonesia

4261

2646

1523

Canada

2591

7974

Vietnam

3845

2711

4313

1336

65689

Source: Table 3 of the Fifth NCF Report based on Agriculture At a Glance [2002] Ministry
of Agriculture

In order to achieve higher growth in productivity in agriculture, the NCF recommends:

Substantial increase in public investment in agriculture related infrastructure

particularly in irrigation, drainage, land development, water conservation, research
development and road connectivity etc.

A national network of advanced soil testing laboratories with facilities for detection
of micronutrient deficiencies.

Promotion of conservation farming, which will help farm families to conserve and
improve soil health, water quantity and quality and biodiversity.

Credit and Insurance

Timely and adequate supply of credit is a basic requirement of small farm families.
The NCF suggests:

Expand the outreach of the formal credit system to reach the really poor and needy.

Reduce rate of interest for crop loans to 4 per cent simple, with government support.

Moratorium on debt recovery, including loans from non-institutional sources, and

waiver of interest on loans in distress hotspots and during calamities, till capability is
restored.

Establish an Agriculture Risk Fund to provide relief to farmers in the aftermath of

successive natural calamities.

Issue Kisan Credit Cards to women farmers, with joint pattas as collateral.

Develop an integrated credit-cum-crop-livestock-human health insurance package.

Expand crop insurance cover to cover the entire country and all crops, with reduced
premiums and create a Rural Insurance Development Fund to take up development
work for spreading rural insurance.

Promote sustainable livelihoods for the poor by improving (i) Financial services (ii)
Infrastructure (iii) Investments in human development, agriculture and business
development services (including productivity enhancement, local value addition, and
alternate market linkages) and (iv) Institutional development services (forming and
strengthening producers' organisations such as self-help groups and water user
associations).

Food Security
The Mid-term appraisal of the 10th Plan revealed that India is lagging behind in achieving the
Millennium Development Goals of halving hunger by 2015. Therefore, the decline in per
capita foodgrain availability and its unequal distribution have serious implications for food
security in both rural and urban areas.
The proportion of households below the poverty line was 28% in 2004-05 (close to 300
million persons). However, in 1999-2000, the percentage of population consuming diets
providing less than 2400 kcal (underlines definition of below poverty line) per capita per day
was almost 77% of the rural population. Several studies have shown that the poverty is
concentrated and food deprivation is acute in predominantly rural areas with limited
resources such as rain-fed agricultural areas.
The report recommends:

Implement a universal public distribution system. The NCF pointed out that the total
subsidy required for this would be one per cent of the Gross Domestic Product.

Reorganise the delivery of nutrition support programmes on a life-cycle basis with

the participation of Panchayats and local bodies.

Eliminate micronutrient deficiency induced hidden hunger through an integrated food

cum fortification approach.

Promote the establishment of Community Food and Water Banks operated by Women
Self-help Groups (SHG), based on the principle Store Grain and Water everywhere'.

Help small and marginal farmers to improve the productivity, quality and profitability
of farm enterprises and organize a Rural Non-Farm Livelihood Initiative.

Formulate a National Food Guarantee Act continuing the useful features of the Food
for Work and Employment Guarantee programmes. By increasing demand for
foodgrains as a result of increased consumption by the poor, the economic conditions
essential for further agricultural progress can be created.

Prevention of Farmers' Suicides

In the last few years, a large number of farmers have committed suicide. Cases of suicides
have been reported from states such as Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Kerala,
Punjab, Rajasthan, Orissa and Madhya Pradesh. The NCF has underlined the need to
address the farmer suicide problem on a priority basis.
Some of measures suggested include:

Provide affordable health insurance and revitalize primary healthcare centres. The
National Rural Health Mission should be extended to suicide hotspot locations on
priority basis.

Set up State level Farmers' Commission with representation of farmers for ensuring
dynamic government response to farmers' problems.

Restructure microfinance policies to serve as Livelihood Finance, i.e. credit coupled

with support services in the areas of technology, management and markets.

Cover all crops by crop insurance with the village and not block as the unit for
assessment.

Provide for a Social Security net with provision for old age support and health
insurance.

Promote aquifer recharge and rain water conservation. Decentralise water use
planning and every village should aim at Jal Swaraj with Gram Sabhas serving as
Pani Panchayats.

Ensure availability of quality seed and other inputs at affordable costs and at the right
time and place.

Recommend low risk and low cost technologies which can help to provide maximum
income to farmers because they cannot cope with the shock of crop failure,
particularly those associated with high cost technologies like Bt cotton.

Need for focused Market Intervention Schemes (MIS) in the case of life-saving crops
such as cumin in arid areas. Have a Price Stabilisation Fund in place to protect the
farmers from price fluctuations.

Need swift action on import duties to protect farmers from international price.

Set up Village Knowledge Centres (VKCs) or Gyan Chaupals in the farmers' distress
hotspots. These can provide dynamic and demand driven information on all aspects
of agricultural and non-farm livelihoods and also serve as guidance centres.

Public awareness campaigns to make people identify early signs of suicidal behavior.

Competitiveness of Farmers
It is imperative to raise the agricultural competitiveness of farmers with small land holdings.
Productivity improvement to increase the marketable surplus must be linked to assured and
remunerative marketing opportunities.
The measures suggested by NCF include:

Promotion of commodity-based farmers' organisations such as Small Cotton Farmers'

Estates to combine decentralised production with centralised services such as postharvest management, value addition and marketing, for leveraging institutional
support and facilitating direct farmer-consumer linkage.

Improvement in implementation of Minimum Support Price (MSP). Arrangements

for MSP need to be put in place for crops other than paddy and wheat. Also, millets
and other nutritious cereals should be permanently included in the PDS.

MSP should be at least 50% more than the weighted

average cost of production.

Availability of data about spot and future prices of commodities through the Multi
Commodity Exchange (MCD) and the NCDEX and the APMC electronic networks
covering 93 commodities through 6000 terminals and 430 towns and cities.

State Agriculture Produce Marketing Committee Acts [APMC Acts] relating to

marketing, storage and processing of agriculture produce need to shift to one that
promotes grading, branding, packaging and development of domestic and
international markets for local produce, and move towards a Single Indian Market.

Employment
Structural change in the workforce is taking place in India albeit slowly. In 1961, the
percentage of the workforce in agriculture was 75.9%. while the number decreased to 59.9%
in 1999-2000. But agriculture still provides the bulk of employment in the rural areas.
The overall employment strategy in India must seek to achieve two things. First, create
productive employment opportunities and second to improve the quality' of employment in
several sectors such that real wages rise through improved productivity. The measures to do
so include:

Accelerating the rate of growth of the economy;

Emphasizing on relatively more labour intensive sectors and inducing a faster growth
of these sectors; and

Improving the functioning of the labour markets through such modification as may
be necessary without eroding the core labour standards.

Encourage non-farm employment opportunities by developing particular sectors and

sub-sectors where demand for the product or services is growing namely: (i) trade,
(ii) restaurants and hotels, (iii) transport, (iv) construction, (v) repairs and (vi) certain
services.

The "net take home income" of farmers should be comparable to those of civil
servants.

Bioresources
Rural people in India depend on a wide range of bioresources for their nutrition and
livelihood security. The report recommends:

Preserving traditional rights of access to biodiversity, which include access to nontimber forest products including medicinal plants, gums and resins, oil yielding plants
and beneficial micro-organisms;

Conserving, enhancing and improving crops and farm animals as well as fish stocks
through breeding;

Encouraging community-based breed conservation (i.e. conservation through use);

Allowing export of indigenous breeds and import of suitable breeds to increase

productivity of nondescript animals.