Govt should leave agriculture commodities on market

The government should not involve in purchasing of agriculture commodities and leave it to the market, except for distribution from PDS (public distribution system) and other channels, said ITC Agri Business and IT Group Head S Sivakumar.
He also suggested that the government should consider various options to ensure farmers get MSP (minimum support price) for their crop as done in Madhya Pradesh, where under Bhavantar model farmers are paid the differential amount of market price and MSP.
"Government can do some part of physical activity that may be required to deal with the some level of the distribution and so on and large part of the activity should be left to the markets," Sivakumar said here on a media round table.

He further said: "We have seen in the past. Some states had attempted onion when the prices went up, it reversed from the support point of angle and there was loss of income".
According to him, if the national priority is to raise the farmer's income then consumers would have to pay higher price.
"This would mean higher farmer income and this would necessary mean till some degree higher consumer prices," Sivakumar added.
However, he also said that private players will play a key supplementary role in bringing more efficiencies through processing so that consumers do not get penalised.
"Therefore, private players will play a key supplementary role in bringing more efficiencies through processing so that consumers do not get penalised," he added.