India's best dramebaaz

India's Best Dramebaaz is a reality show for 5-12 year old children that is different from many others. Unlike many other shows the children are not stressed and seem to be enjoying while learning and honing not only their acting skills but also lessons in life. The concepts are educating for adults too.

I was tempted to write this after the play depicting farmers predicament (18 May 2013, starts at 18th minute). In the act, Aditya was brilliant and the judges have already conveyed that and I cannot add to it. But, what is even more commendable is the concept and the message that was portrayed that taking ones life is not the solution. A socially relevant issue was handled very sensitively. It also has lessons for reportage.  Kudos to the mentors and the judges.

Of course, the sensitivity with which issues are handled is true of many other acts such as pressure of studies on children, caring for old parents, the environment and many others while opening up our eyes to history, culture and other contemporary issues. I am not elaborating on those. The reason for speaking about a particular theme could also be because of my own related research on Maharashtra or about Agrarian Crisis in India leading to possible solutions in rainfed agriculture among others.

Farmers’ suicides and crisis in Indian agriculture

Nearly a quarter million farmers’ suicides have been recorded in India in the last 15 years, ie 45 farmer suicides per day or almost one every 33 minutes. The suicide mortality rate (SMR, suicide deaths per 100,000 persons) of male farmers has been greater than that of male non-farmers (see Figure 1). The SMR for male farmers peaked to 19.2 (almost 40 per cent higher than that of non-farmers) in 2004. Subsequently, it has been declining (except for 2009, a drought year) and is to be at 16.1 in 2011.  Despite the continuing high incidences of farmers’ suicides, the declining trend gives a hope that the farm sector is perhaps getting back and other data also show that the farm sector was doing relatively well in recent years.

Calculated using a method described in an earlier work by the author and based on data from the National Crime Records Bureau and Census of India.

While acknowledging, the relatively better performance of agriculture in recent years, the decline in the incidence of farmers’ suicides is also because of the reporting of farmer suicides in some other category that led to recording zero farmers’ suicides in the state of Chhattisgarh, which had been reporting more than 1,000 farmers’ suicides per annum prior to 2011. Then, of course, there is the overall underreporting of suicides because of social stigma and the fact that suicide continues to be criminal offence under the statute books of the Indian Penal Code. Keeping aside our apprehension on data for a different exercise, SMR for male farmers in 2011 are 290 for Kerala, 49 for Maharashtra,  42 for Andhra Pradesh, and 37 for Karnataka and more than three-fifths of the farmers’ suicides in the year were reported from these four states.

Following the classic work of Durkheim on suicides, almost a hundred years ago, it goes without saying that a high incidence of suicides among a particular sub-group of population is indicative of a socio-economic problem. Of course, its absence does not deny the absence of a crisis among farmers in other regions/states. The crisis in Indian agriculture is pervasive and much more spread out than the spread of famers’ suicides.

Besides farmer distress, the social crisis is observed in food and nutrition insecurity, and social conflicts that has also taken the form of extremism in some parts of the country among others. The economic crisis in agriculture is said to be on account of technology fatigue, stagnating productivity, declining fertilizer use efficiency, low growth with high input usage, subsidies surpassing investments, and increasing cost of cultivation. To add to it there is the ecological crisis reflected through soil degradation, falling water tables, destruction of friendly predators and parasites, biomass loss in commons, and increasing risks from climate change.

This crisis is as much because of inadequate and inappropriate planning as much it is because of an emphasis on means rather than ends. To address this crisis, the government has responded with a number of programmes. The major response was to expand the green revolution areas beyond the irrigated areas to other areas that are largely rainfed.  This comes with the assumption that the technology and science meant for irrigated water abundant areas should be transferable to other areas. The current response, unfortunately, is suggesting more of the same which has already brought about the crisis.

Further, such an argument stems from the perspective of making food available at a macro level and it is this that subsumes the issues of accessibility and affordability to the public distribution system and not by strengthening the local production system, but by imposing a production system that is largely mono-cropping in nature. This also compromises the risk taking ability inherent in a system that thrives on diversity and mutual dependence. For instance, a good foliage cover will provide fodder for livestock, who in turn will provide manure to the soil that in turn will help the plant grow. Similarly, cultivation of multiple crops could also mean that all the crops need not be vulnerable to a particular unforeseen climatic fluctuation, but it could have adverse implications in a mono-cropping system.

A very nice initiative of the Government of India is the Rashtriya Krishi Vikash Yojana initiated since the 11^th Five Year Plan. The logic behind this initiative is that the planning from agriculture should start from the village level and then be aggregated to block, district, state and nation, respectively. In short, it should be bottom-up, and, I would say a novel initiative. But, the problem is that this initiative also comes with a message from the Prime Minister that we should be able to achieve 4 per cent growth per annum in agriculture. In real terms, this means that there should be production growth. Independent, of the fact that this is impossible and not even required because our population growth is about 1.6 per cent per annum.  What is more, this imposition from top comes with a plan that moves from state to district to the village.

So, we have a bottom-up thinking being implemented through a top-down structure. This top-down structure is entrenched in many of our institutions. Scientists and technocrats, more often than not working in silos, would come up with ideas that is to be the input the farmer will use. The agricultural administration facilitates the provisioning of these inputs that are largely tied through some subsidy schemes. This top-down structure unfortunately means that generation and dissemination of knowledge is a one-way process. The farmers become passive recipients and are not active participants in the process.

Another much talked about initiative is the farm debt waiver of 70,000 INR in 2008 (17.5 billion USD; the approximate exchange rate then is 1 USD=40 INR). This, of course, is a fiscal decision and government in many parts of the world have been taking such decisions and I would leave it at that. However, it needs to be mentioned that this is book-keeping exercise that helped the banks do away with their non-performing assets. For the farmers who benefitted (there are many who didn’t), it would reduce the mental burden and also make them eligible for fresh loans. It is the fresh loans that would help them get back to the agricultural activities. However, the market-dependent input-intensive production where rate of increase in cost is greater than net returns, debt-servicing would be a casualty, particularly in bad years. This also increases the risks in the agricultural production process.

Many a times proponents of the input-intensive argument would suggest that the criticisms are well taken, but there is no alternative, TINA. This is not correct. Actually, like mother earth, multiple alternatives exist, MAE. The alternatives focus on diverse and integrated production systems that are better adapted to climatic variability and take into consideration the local specificities. It needs to be mentioned that the alternative being proposed is not a blind call to tradition. It does borrow some of the positive aspects from tradition, but it is based on science and is knowledge-centric. This means that to propagate this alternative will require an investment that has a different logic. In particular, investments that enable peoples’ capabilities to make them active participants will be crucial, as they are the real wealth of nations.

(This write-up is based on related recent work that the author has been associated with and meant for spring 2013 edition of the Newsletter of the Association of Indian Economic and Financial Studies, AIEFS, http://www.aiefs.org/. It was first written on 2 April 2013 and has been slightly edited for this blog.)

HDR 2013 - Rise of the Global South

The Human Development Report 2013 - Rise of the South: Human Progress in a Diverse World is out. In HDI rankings, Norway ranks first, but Australia (#2) and New Zealand (#6) do better than Norway when it comes to non-income HDI.
 
US (#3) fares poorly in terms of life expectancy as it is below 30 countries. This means that at a higher level of attainment, shortfalls in one dimension are compensated by attainments in other dimensions. Future calculations of HDI could use An Alternative Approach to Measure HDI or choose from A Class of Human Development Index Measures. These address the inequity across dimensions. In other words, as the average attainment increases, the same deviation from a balanced approach is considered worse off. It turns out that the HDI computed with geometric mean does not satisfy this.

Conflict-torn Democratic Republic of the Congo and drought-affected Niger jointly take the last position at #186, but despite the odds they are the ones that have made impressive improvements. In fact, the story from HDR 2013 is the rise of the Global South. It is pertinent that when the North slowed down because of the financial crisis during 2007/2008, it is the entrepreneurship of masses and social innovations in diverse settings with proactive state that have helped in this progress. Fourteen countries, mostly low-HDI ones from Africa (including DR Congo and Niger), made HDI gains of at least 2 per cent per annum since 2000.

In 150 years, the year 2010 marks a turnaround as Brazil (#85), China (#101) and India (#136) together have a combined income as that of the six industrial countries of Canada (#11), France (#20), Germany(#5), Italy(#25), UK (#26) and US. The middle class is growing in the South and they are demanding better services, but one should not forget that income inequalities are widening.

I take the liberty to get out of the report and provide some pointers for India. Some recent successes in India are the state-facilitated livelihood missions (see BRLPS, SERP and also NRLM) among others. Civil society participation also have made significant contributions leading to recent legislations on Right to Education and Right to Information. There also have been public movements such as India Against Corruption, Jan Swasthya Abhiyan, and Right to Food. Another recent initiative is the RRA Network, which advocates for a differentiated policy and support system for revitalizing rainfed agriculture.

To sustain the momentum, the report calls for enhancing equity, enabling voice and participation, confronting environmental challenges and managing demographic change.The report reiterates the need to change the structures of global institutions to involve and articulate the concerns of the South, to bring in plural concerns and to unravel that the notions of 'publicness' and 'privateness' in our understanding of public goods are social constructs. Bringing about effective interventions needs good leadership who can keep vested interests out of decision making.

'Development' as Threat

It is not poverty, but 'development' that is the greatest threat to society, polity, humanity and environment. This is so because the notion of development envisaged is very narrowly defined leading to a misplaced emphasis on superficial aspects and is focused on the 'economy' which also is very narrowly defined. It follows that the impacts from such an endeavour are at best illusory as if in a mirage. This has led to a neglect of real aspects and thereby neglecting people and other matters of relevance. 

This comes as a reaction to the picture posted above, that I saw in facebook. The caption of the picture is as follows.

Face of Development and Plight of the Displaced:

These couple were newly married when the Hirakud Dam was constructed in the 50s. They were forced to vacate their village as the reservoir water started entering the village. They gathered all that they could and carried to a new place which the Govt. said they should go and stay. They built their own hut with local materials like twigs, grass and clay. They owned 5 acres of land in their original village but are landless now. They are wage earners at this age!!

Fifty years on, that is still their fate. The government says this is development. The couple asks, 'is it?'

This, of course, questions the interpretation of Indira Gandhi's speech, as the then Prime Minister of India, at the UN Conference in Stockholm in 1972 which some people equate with tagging poverty being a threat to environment. And, of course, questions the narrow interpretation of the  governments in India as also elsewhere on the meaning of development.

Remarks On Rural Credit For Globalising Farmers

I happened to be the chair for the technical session on 'Rural Credit for Globalising Farmers' at the 26th National Conference on Agricultural Marketing, organised by Indian Society of Agricultural Marketing (ISAM), Nagpur and Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics (GIPE), Pune held at Yashanvantrao Chavan Academy of Development Administration (YASHADA), Pune, during 20-22 December 2012. The following are my remarks for the session.

Credit is an important requirement for the farmers, who are risk-taking entrepreneurs. This will help them take up usage of inputs or a technological innovation that they perceive or are made to perceive is beneficial for them. Of course, as an aside, one can state that many technological innovations (including the green revolution) are taken up because of a subsidy component that distorts the actual prices as well as perceptions. Besides, the mindless transfer of such technology meant for certain agro-climatic conditions or to certain cropping patterns to all scenarios may not be appropriate. 

Taking a clue from the Presidential address by Professor V. M. Rao, one may also add that the reaction to the food non-availability crisis in the mid 1960s was an emergency requirement; the danger was to have converted such an action to be part of the normal design. This manner of functioning was inefficient in the sense that it distorted prices but it was also iniquitous by focusing on some well-endowed regions. Unfortunately, its inappropriate application also had adverse implications for such well-endowed regions down the line.

Another point that I would like to stress to this august house is on some important but distinct connotations that the word 'market' can have. For instance, market is a place where the farmer (as also you and I) have the freedom and right to buy and sell.

We also at times imply by market to a state where the price is efficient. This second usage draws from the classic condition that in a market there are large number of buyers and sellers, and hence, none of them can influence the price to suit their own vested interest. Such a market clearing price at equilibrium is efficient and fair. 

A third and an increasingly important usage of the market in a globalising context is where efficiency is measured through higher margins (note the difference in the meaning of efficiency under an equilibrium price). It is this latter logic that is invoked in many policy debates and decisions including the FDI in retail.

One has no problems with any of the meanings ascribed to the word, but it is problematic if one uses this word interchangeably. In particular, the third usage is argued to give a fair price as also freedom and space to transact. We should be clear about these distinctions and use them appropriately. 

Having said these, one would now get back to the presentations made at Technical session 1 on 'Rural Credit for Globalising Farmers' and some recommendation that emanate out of these deliberations. Nine papers were presented. The presentations are:

• 'Warehousing Receipt Finance of Agriculture Commodities in Andhra Pradesh' by P. Kanaka Durga (Anil Kumar and Aldas Janaiah)
• 'A Comparative Study of Cultivating Rose in Open Field and Greenhouse as Cut Flowers - An Empirical Study' by (Sujata Majumdar and) Debabrata Lahiri
• 'Wheat Growers in Ludhiana District of Punjab - Asset Positions, Credit Requirements and its Sources' by Veena Goel (and Gurpreet Kaur)
• 'Development of Agricultral Marketing in India' by S. K. Dhage
• 'Measuring Inclusiveness of Agriculture Credit Flow in India' by Nirupam Mehrotra
• 'Agricultural Credit System in the Tribal Belt of Odisha: The Case of Maize Production' by Brajaraja Mishra
• 'Emerging Trends and Policy Options in Agriculture - Production, Marketing and Credit' by Samir Samantara
• 'Rural Credit for Globalizing Farmers' by Sangeet Kumar
• 'Weak Penetration of Institutional Credit and Farmers' Suicides in Maharashtra' by Dnyandev Talule

From the above nine presentation, five were based on primary field based work that enriched the deliberations because of the variety of contexts (warehousing receipts, rose cultivation, wheat growers, tribal farmers cultivating maize, and farmers' suicides) as well as their spread across the country (Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal, Punjab, Odisha and Maharashtra), two were based on secondary data on credit raising policy issues with one of them looking into some measurement issues of inequality, and two were written in the style of general essays.

Some recommendations coming from the presentations as also the deliberations are as follows:

• The farmers usage of warehouse storage facility is constrained by a legitimate fear that the quality of the stored produce would deteriorate. This calls for improving the quality of management, quality of service, efficiency of handling and safety of the stored goods. 
• Uncertainty in prices and the risks therein brought into discussion a possible reliance on hedging through futures market but it also raised further risks of transactions through this virtual medium that has nothing to do with physical transactions.
• Medium and large farmers appear to be primarily accessing the storage services whereas the need for safe and efficient storing to escape distressed sale of their produce is greater for the small and marginal farmers. Efforts need to be made to make storage viable for the latter.
• Unlike greenhouses farmers, the open field farmers producing cut rose did not have access to formal credit. The banks in this region may come forward to give them loans for setting up greenhouse structures and also for producing under open field conditions.
• The study of wheat growers indicate that small and marginal farmers are constrained in the production process (as they have to rely on the market for renting out farm machinery and equipment increasing the cost of production) and selling of produce (during lean season at a lower price). This reiterates our earlier point of the greater relevance of warehouse facilities for small and marginal farmers. It also points out that they may need greater operational credit because of higher cost of production. Its feasibility will depend on the returns from cultivation for these farmers.
• Interlocking of credit with input and output markets had adverse implications on tribal farmers' income. Alternative forms of agriculture that could reduce dependence on market-based inputs while not compromising on the production (low external input sustainable agriculture - LEISA) and facilitate marketing of the same at a premium price should be explored.
• Farmers' suicides are a failure of hope as also a symptom of the crisis in Indian agriculture. There seems to be a greater debt burden for such households when compared with non-suicide households. The debt burden for such households also seems to be higher from non-institutional sources. This is worrying because the study conducted in early 2012 (which is also a drought year) seems to have negated the benefits from debt-waiver and increased the riskiness with the negative returns. It does raise the question on usage of technology-centric (Bt seeds) and financial-centric (debt waiver) solutions while not giving much focus on the real world problem (livelihood crisis). To ensure success of debt waiver there should have been focus on improving incomes while not increasing the risks, particularly in a bad year. This reiterates the relevance of LEISA indicated above.
• The failure of seeds due to spuriousness or any other reason calls for compensating the farmers' income and not just the seed cost by the supplier.
• Improving institutional access to credit in a timely manner and even clubbing the same with non-credit inputs could be an alternative. Formation of Self-help Groups (SHGs) and linking them to banks could also help. In short, there is a case for promotion of groups of borrowers (produce based, service based, caste based, village based, and cluster based that are either vertically or horizontally integrated).
• There is also a case to take credit beyond production and link it with post-harvest operations like sorting, grading, packaging and marketing and this can be made to groups, as indicated above.
• Some of the eastern states share of agricultural credit is lower than their share of area under cultivation or irrigation. These are also the states where the small and marginal farmers get a lower share of credit compared to their share of area. If focusing on East is a concern for policy planners to increase agricultural production then the credit disbursement in these areas need to change. Some thought also needs to be given on the appropriate technology.

(This is a slightly revised version of the presentation made at the plenary session. While acknowledging that I used my liberty as a chair of the session to represent the views indicated at the session and take responsibility for the same. However, if something has been left out, it was not intentional.  I am thankful to Abhay Tilak, Rapporteur for the session, for sharing his inputs and the paper presenters and all those present there for a lively discussion.)

IGIDR in her silver jubilee

1 December 2012

Today, IGIDR
 is decked in her bridal finery,
To begin with pomp and grandeur
 her silver jubilee show.

Current and some past Directors
 are all in their territory,
With a few former RBI Governors
 and the incumbent one in tow.

Multitude of dignitaries
 are lined up for their wizardry,
In attendance are invitees
 who listen and wonder in wow.

Damsel with a Pitcher

'Kalasi Kakhei Rupasi' by Sabita Pradhan
(translated by Srijit Mishra)

[This is a beautiful poem in Odia (Oriya). It is difficult to translate, but ...]

'Damsel with a Pitcher'

A damsel with a pitcher on her waist, 

walks daintily away with soft steps.

Her girdle-like waist chain and anklet,

swing to a song that the twain makes.

Slow and steady comes the lazy wind,

to give her body a gentle caress.

The autumn moon hidden behind the cloud(s),

gives her stalking stealthy glances.



[Note: The 's' in clouds could be silent to rhyme with wind. Note on 14 September 2012: The poet's use of words  and phrases is powerful and gives a vivid visualization of rural Odissa (Orissa), or India. Some words that are normally not used are kati referring to waist, kinkini referring to an ornament worn around the waist. Bhodua means the month of bhadrab, after shravan; the beginning of the season of sarata/sharad, ie, late monsoon/early autumn. Thus, bhoduara chanda is translated to autumn moon. Earlier, I had used 'autumn clouds'.]

Transliteration with English alphabets would be as follows

Kakhare kalasi kakhai rupasi

Pada chapi jebe chale.

Kaatire Kinkini Padare paunji

Runu jhunu gita bole.

Alasi pabana thiri thiri asi

Dehaku ta' chuin jae.

Bouda bhitaru bhoduara chanda

Chorai chorai chahen.

       

See another translation

For Mother (Bou), Original by Dillip Balabantaray

Also see two secular odia poems written using English transliteration.

He Anandamya by Madhusudhan Rao

Ahe Dayamaya by Ramkrushna Nanda