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The Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, with the Deputy Chairman, Planning Commission, Mr Montek Singh Ahluwalia, and the Secretary, Mr Rajeev Ratan Shah, at the full Planning Commission meeting in the Capital on Tuesday. - Kamal Narang

New Delhi , Sept. 27

THE Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, today exhorted the States to "accelerate and urgently complete" agricultural marketing reforms to ensure that farmers get a legitimate share in the final value of their produce.

Addressing a meeting of the full Planning Commission here, Dr Singh asked the States to amend the Agricultural Produce Marketing Committee (APMC) Acts to allow for contract and free marketing, organised retailing, smooth flow of raw materials to agro-processing industries, competitive trading and adoption of innovative marketing systems and technologies.

He advocated that Indian agriculture in the future must move away from the traditional grain-based strategy towards diversification to keep up with changing consumer preferences and ensure higher returns to farmers.

Dr Singh also suggested that the possibility of converging the resources under Bharat Nirman and the National Employment Guarantee Scheme with those of the Ministries of Agriculture and Water Resources should be explored. This, he said, would increase the asset base of agriculture.

APMC Act amendment: Later, the Union Agriculture Minister, Mr Sharad Pawar, told newspersons that six States have already amended their APMC Acts and another 8-9 States are in the process of amending it. "They should complete the amendment process over the next 2-3 months," he said.

NDC sub-committee meet: Announcing that the first meeting of the sub-committee (on agriculture) of the National Development Council (NDC) would be held on October 4, Mr Pawar said that all the challenges faced by Indian agriculture identified today would be discussed at the NDC sub-committee.

"No decisions were taken today at the meeting of the Planning Commission. We were trying to get a perspective of the Agriculture Ministry on the issues and challenges," the Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission, Mr Montek Singh Ahluwalia, said.

He said that the views of Agriculture Ministry would be taken on board in a paper that Planning Commission would prepare. This paper would be a backgrounder for the NDC sub-committee meeting of October 4 and also be used for the 11th Plan document.

Productivity & profitability: Stating that there was a need to increase the profitability of farming, Mr Ahluwalia said that the solution lies in stepping up the productivity.

"While it is true that investments in agriculture have gone down, productivity too has gone down. The policies of the Agriculture Ministry and the Planning Commission are designed to increase the productivity and profitability of farming," Mr Ahluwalia said.

On the Prime Minister's concern over the weakening of domestic demand for major farm products, Dr Abhijit Sen, Member, Planning Commission, said, "It could be addressed from the domestic side through Employment Guarantee Scheme and reaching parts of country where we cannot reach. It could also come from higher exports," he said.

Dr Sen also said, "We need new technological breakthroughs to lower cost of production. The technology that was working for last 30 years cannot work for the next 30 years".

`Reform tenancy rights clause'

THE Planning Commission has called for further progress in land reforms in the context of tenancy rights. This is crucial if tenant farmers are to get easy access to institutional credit, according to the Plan panel.

"In the case of tenant farmers, their tenancy rights are usually not recorded. This comes in the way of their accessing institutional credit since they cannot establish that they are the people growing the crops," Mr Ahluwalia said, underscoring the need to correct the situation.

While highlighting that institutional credit to the farm sector has expanded in the recent years, he noted that it has gone primarily to the large farmers.

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