With a promise to double the income of the farmers over the next six years, the Union Government on Monday unveiled a slew of measures in the Budget for 2016-17, focusing on boosting the agro-economy and allocating nearly Rs 36,000 crore for the farm sector which was under stress because of drought. Besides, the agri-credit target has been raised to Rs 9 lakh crore for the next fiscal.
A unified agricultural market will be launched on April 14 to provide a common e-market platform for wholesale markets, and soil health cards will be provided to all 14 crore farmers by March 2017. To increase agricultural productivity, the Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sichai Yojana has been strengthened and implemented in mission mode and a dedicated long Term Irrigation Fund will be created in NABARD with an initial corpus of about Rs 20,000 crore.
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley also allocated Rs 15,000 crore for interest subvention on the farm credit and reduce burden of loan on farmers, Rs 5,500 crore for the new crop insurance scheme and Rs 500 crore to boost pulses output. In order to collect money for farmer welfare programmes, the Government has decided to levy a Krishi Kalyan Cess, at 0.5 per cent on all taxable services from June 1, 2016.
“Proceeds from the cess would be exclusively used for financing initiatives for improvement of agriculture and welfare of farmers,” Jaitley said in his Budget speech. Terming farmers as the backbone of country’s food security, the Finance Minister said it was time to give back to the farmers “a sense of
income security”.
“Our total allocation on agriculture and farmers welfare is Rs 35,984 crore,” Jaitley said, while asserting special focus has been given to ensure adequate and timely flow of credit to farmers. “Against the target of Rs 8.5 lakh crore in 2015-16, the target of agricultural credit in 2016-17 will be all-time high of Rs 9 lakh crore,” Jaitley announced.
Special focus has also given on creating infrastructure for irrigation which is a critical for increasing agriculture production. Out of 141 million hectares of net cultivated area in the country, only 46% is covered with irrigation. “We need to address issues of optimal utilisation of our water resources; create new infrastructure for irrigation; conserve soil fertility with balanced use of fertilizer; and provide value addition and connectivity from farm to markets,” Jaitley said.
For this, the Minister said ‘Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchai Yojana’ has been strengthened and will be implemented in mission mode so that nearly 28.5 lakh hectares can be brought under irrigation under this scheme. Implementation of 89 irrigation projects under AIBP, which have been languishing, will be fast tracked. This will help irrigate 80.6 lakh hectares. The Minister stressed these projects require 17,000 crore next year and 86,500 crore in the next five years. He also gave a deadline saying: “We will ensure that 23 of these projects are completed before March 31, 2017.”
To achieve all these, a total provision of 12,517 crore has been made through budgetary support and market borrowings in 2016-17. Simultaneously, a major programme for sustainable management of groundwater resources has been prepared with an estimated cost of 6,000 crore and proposed for multilateral funding. At least 5 lakh farm ponds and dug wells in rain-fed areas and 10 lakh compost pits for production of organic manure will be taken up by making productive use of the allocations under MGNREGA.
Jaitley said the Government has provided a path breaking crop insurance scheme ‘Prime Minister Fasal Bima Yojana’, for which Rs 5,500 crore has been allocated for effective implementation in 2016-17. The Government will also promote organic farming through ‘Parmparagat Krishi Vikas Yojana’ and ‘Organic Value Chain Development in North-East Region’.
To make dairying more remunerative to the farmers, four new projects will be taken up. Rs 850 crore has been set aside for four dairying projects -- ‘Pashudhan Sanjivani’, an animal wellness programme and provision of Animal Health Cards (Nakul Swasthya Patra); an Advanced breeding technology; Creation of ‘E-Pashudhan Haat’, an e market portal for connecting breeders and farmers; and a National Genomic Centre for indigenous breeds.
To ensure that the benefit of Minimum Support Price reaches farmers in all parts of the country three specific initiatives will be taken up in 2016-17. First, the remaining States will be encouraged to take up decentralized procurement. Second, an online Procurement System will be undertaken through the Food Corporation of India. This will usher in transparency and convenience to the farmers through prior registration and monitoring of actual procurement. Third, effective arrangements have been made for pulses procurement.