Govts responsible for neglect of farm sector: Commission

Blaming the successive regimes at the Centre for neglect of the farm sector, the National Commission of Farmers has deplored the poor state of agriculture in Uttar Pradesh and the rest of the country.

A two-member team of the commission, which was here last week, said it was solely focused on the progress of agriculture sector and that the "neglect of farmers" was the main reason for their bad condition.

The two-member team interacted with farmers and officials here to ascertain their views and opinions on this. The commission has announced that it will submit its final report to the Centre on October 4.

Commission Secretary Atul Sinha told media persons here during his interaction with the farmers, it was found that poor irrigation infrastructure , lack of water management and mixed farming along with poor quality agriculture inputs and other operational hazards were the main reasons for the poor condition of the farm sector in the state.

Appreciating the measures taken by the UP government for boosting the agriculture sector, he said "Due to pro-active policies, the agriculture sector has flourished in UP and elsewhere, yet there was no material change in the condition of farmers even after India became self-sufficient in food grains."

He said during visits to other parts of UP, it was found that low investment in agriculture, import of agricultural products, increase in farm input costs and non-completion of irrigation projects were some major complaints of farmers.

Some suggestions that came up before the Commission include the expedition of reforms in the abolition of the zamindari system and the Land Reforms Act, which could help remove legal hurdles while problems related to the marketing of farm produce be taken care of by the government itself.

Sinha said the Commission had already submitted three reports to the government after it was constituted in February 2004 and the final report would be submitted on October 4, as the tenure of the Commission expires on October 13.