Punjab and Haryana may not gain from the thrust on agriculture in Union Budget

The euphoria over the thrust towards the agriculture in the Union Budget presented by the Union Finance Minister is missing in Punjab and Haryana. The states may not gain much from the announcements made in the budget statement.

The projection of doubling the farm income by 2020 cannot be achieved here since the two states have a high yield of 10-12 tonne per acre. According to the economists, the average yield here is comparable to the yield in the international farming and cannot be increased substantially.Thus raising the income to this extent may not be plausible.

Talking to Buisness Standard, Manpreet Badal, and former Finance Minister of Punjab said that doubling the income in six years means to achieve a 15% year-on-year growth in agriculture. "This cannot be achieved in a short span of time. There is a need to wean away the people from agriculture to other sectors and arm them with skillsets in Punjab," Badal said.

Punjab has already refused to accept the Crop Insurance Scheme of the Centre as the state wants a lower premium rate for the farmers. Punjab is also not ready to knock down the trade barrier for the Unified Agriculture Marketing Scheme that envisages a common e-market platform for 585 regulated wholesale markets. The budget has allocated Rs 15,000 cr towards the interest subvention, to ease out the debt repayment of the farmers in the drought hit areas.

The states of Punjab and Haryana fall under irrigated areas and the farmers here would not be eligible for this relaxation on the borrowing from institutional sector. Farmers have welcomed the 0.5% Krishi Kalyan cess which is proposed to be used for financing initiatives for improvement of agriculture and welfare of farmers. Punjab is hoping to get Rs 7,200 cr for revamping its canal network for four major projects. The Finance Minister has allocated 17,000 cr for irrigation projects under Accelerated Irrigation Benefits Program scheme.