Rapid agricultural growth needed: PM

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Thursday said India cannot achieve its goal of making its villages prosperous without rapid agricultural growth.

"We have constantly endeavoured to increase production and to ensure that farmers get remunerative prices for their produce. In the last nine years, support prices for various crops have been enhanced as never before," the prime minister said in his Independence Day address.

"The support prices for wheat and paddy have been more than doubled. Many states which faced shortages of food-grains earlier are now producing more than what they require for themselves," he added.

India's food-grain production reached 25.9 crore tonne in 2011-12.

The average annual rate of agricultural growth in the 11th Plan was 3.6, which is more than both the 9th and 10th Plan levels.

"We now see clear indications of enhanced economic prosperity in our rural areas. In the period 2004 to 2011, rural per-capita consumption has increased four times faster than earlier," he said, adding rural wages had also increased much faster in this period.