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K. Varadharajan, general secretary of the All India Kisan Sabha and a Polit Bureau member of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), has worked extensively with farmers' problems and the concerns of members of the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes in Tamil Nadu. He spoke to Dionne Bunsha about the reasons for the present farm crisis and alternative policies that can revive the rural economy. Excerpts:
Rural India has always been poor. What makes you say that there is an agrarian crisis today?
Earlier, the government tried to give some assistance to peasants so that they could increase production. It gave subsidies, some importance to irrigation, some allotment in the Budget. In 1951, the share of agriculture in capital formation was 17 per cent. It has now come down to just 7 per cent.
The government argues that private investment will step in. But our experience in the last 15 years is that without government investment, private investment does not increase. For infrastructure development alone, if they are to allot funds as they did in 1951, they will have to spend Rs. 50,000 crores. That is the big gap.
Rural India can develop only if production increases and they get a proper market and proper prices for their produce. Now, because the markets are linked to the world market, prices are falling. That's why the slight improvement witnessed in villages during the Green Revolution period is going down. Even the Green Revolution helped increase production, but disparity between the rich and the poor also increased. Now it has become worse. Most small and marginal peasants are not interested in agriculture.
In Bengal, Tripura and Kerala, they were able to distribute land. In other States, land reforms were a failure. Even now a large amount of land remains with the landlords.
Unless investment and credit are available to the poorer sections, they cannot compete in the market. Our peasants are not only producers, but consumers too. They are forced to depend on the world market because of the World Trade Organisation [WTO], which is not fair.
Our demand is that credit should be increased to 70 to 80 per cent. In most of the suicide areas, 82 per cent of the loans came from traders and moneylenders. We feel that an alternative is needed.
Is the Green Revolution responsible for the state we are in today? Did the dependence on heavy inputs of fertilizers and pesticides backfire?
That is not true. There are two aspects to this. Even now, our consumption of fertilizers is much less than in Bangladesh, Pakistan or Sri Lanka. It is not the question of inputs that has spoiled land. It is there in a few places. There is no point in blaming fertilizers and inputs. The main drawback of the Green Revolution was that they were relying on richer farmers. Our crisis has happened not because of fertilizers, it is because of the dependence on the rich.
We can develop our wasteland and distribute it to poor peasants. More than five million acres of land can be developed, according to government estimates.
West Bengal has achieved the highest growth in foodgrain production because of land reform. A change is needed along the lines of States that have proved that land reforms work. But at the WTO, instead of saying that small peasants can increase productivity, they say that smaller farmers cannot be productive and so we will give the land to big companies.
Why are the prices crashing?
Mainly because of the removal of import restrictions. Two years back, all oilseed prices crashed. Farmers got 30 or 40 per cent of the previous year's price because we imported large quantities from the U.S. and other countries, which heavily subsidise their agriculture. The U.S. gives its soyabean farmers a subsidy of $165 a quintal for produce whose price is $125 a quintal. With such subsidy, the world market prices are artificially made by MNCs [multinational corporations]. With that price, it destroys all the produce in developing countries.
Prices are crashing because they are wantonly decided by MNCs and because of subsidies. It is not decided by supply and demand. If tomorrow the subsidies stop, we would be at an advantage in the world market because our peasantry is poor. In real terms, cost of production here is much less than in Western countries. The world market is not crashing because of some crisis. It is only to wipe out producers in Third World countries.
It is not true that there is no alternative. They talk about competition in the market. But if the rules are one-sided, how can farmers fight?
Did India achieve anything at the WTO meet in Hong Kong in December 2005?
Even at the last WTO conference in Doha, [Union Minister for Commerce and Industry] Murasoli Maran went there and spoke a lot until the last day. He voiced his protest against the West, but in the end we supported it. Kamal Nath did the same thing in Hong Kong. But finally, he signed. Most of the countries feel they were betrayed by India and Brazil on the final day. Without achieving anything in return, we have given so many concessions to the West.
After the removal of quantitative import restrictions, the only protection farmers had was tariff. Now, the tariff limit cannot be increased. Now they say that tariffs will be considered only in a special case. But our experience has shown that has never happened.
Should India move away from being an agrarian economy for its gross domestic product to increase?
That argument is foolish. Here, 80 per cent of our population is in the villages and most of them are dependent on agriculture. How can we shift away from farming? The entire population will die of starvation.
Even though farmers all over the country are feeling the pinch, why is it that suicides are happening only in some places?
Suicides are happening because prices are crashing. The peasant can adjust to poverty, but he doesn't want to lose his prestige in the village. Around 80 per cent of loans are taken from moneylenders. They come to seize the farmer's house, jewels, land, everything. The farmer feels that it is better to move from the village or court death. That is why the suicides are happening.
There are suicides in almost all States, but in some crops like cotton where the pest attack is very severe or in some places affected by drought or flood, the suicide rate is higher. Wherever there is a peasant movement, they can fight moneylenders. But wherever there is no movement, they have to surrender to moneylenders. In such places, suicides occur. Around 71 per cent of suicides are in rain-fed areas. In many areas, crops like Bt cotton have cheated people. There also has to be a comprehensive insurance scheme, besides more credit, for farmers.
Why is the government ignoring the problem?
They see it as something committed by individuals. Give Rs.3 lakh and settle it - that is their solution. They don't look into the reasons for the suicides. It is in their interest not to do anything. They have this foolish idea of developing industry without bothering about agriculture.
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