India's agri must grow 5% a year to become developed by 2047: Chouhan

Agriculture and allied sectors need to grow at 5 per cent annually on a sustained basis for India to achieve ‘developed country’ status by 2047, Agriculture Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan said on Tuesday.

 

He said that foodgrain is grown on 93 per cent of farmland, but growth in the crop is just 1.5 per cent.

 

“We are working towards bridging the yield gap in crops and achieving a national average yield... If we have to make India a developed nation by 2047, agriculture and allied sectors have to grow at 5 per cent annually,” he said.

 

He was speaking at a press conference on the sidelines of the annual conference of vice-chancellors of agricultural universities and directors of Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR) institutes.

   

The minister was confident of achieving the 5 per cent annual growth rate, emphasising that various agricultural institutes play a key role in this endeavour.

 

“Research plays a very important role in increasing agricultural production and reducing costs. Our target is to maintain an annual agricultural growth rate of 5 per cent. All research institutions must work in one direction to achieve the goals,” he said.

 

Chouhan noted that the agriculture and allied sector must achieve $1 trillion for India to be a $5 trillion economy.

 

He also stressed the need to enhance farm exports to 20 per cent from the current 6 per cent.

 

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On research and development, the minister said that currently, 0.4 per cent of agriculture gross domestic product (GDP) is invested in innovation and research.

 

“We also discussed how to raise the investment to 1 per cent of agriculture GDP,” he added.

 

He pitched for better utilisation of natural resources for agriculture as land holdings are expected to decline to 0.6 hectares by 2047 from the current 1.18 hectares.

 

Chouhan also called for better utilisation of germ plasm.

 

He said, “We currently have 450,000 germ plasms, of which 5 per cent is used. We need to raise this.”

 

The minister added that short, mid, and long-term plans will be chalked out after brainstorming with agricultural institutions.

 

Meanwhile, experts who had gathered at the annual conference said India needs to expand its network of extension workers to ensure that fruits of science reach the over 140 million farmers.

 

“India has around 200,000 agriculture extension workers, while China has around 0.7-0.8 million and Brazil nearly 1 million. We are way behind when it comes to extension manpower,”

said AK Singh, vice-chancellor, Rani Lakshmi Bai Central Agricultural University, Jhansi. 

 

‘Wheat procurement may touch 32 mn tonnes’

 

Food Minister Pralhad Joshi on Tuesday said the government has procured more than 29 million tonnes of wheat so far this year and the figure may touch 32-32.5 million tonnes on record production.

 

The Centre had set a target of procuring 31.5 million tonnes of wheat initially and this was revised to around 33 million tonnes.

 

On allowing wheat exports, Joshi said he will consult other ministries after assessing the stock situation once the procurement season ends.