Letter to Bimol

To a friend who after years of research in Physics experimented with farming for nine years and who wanted to know my impressions from the recent trip to A.P.:
Dear Bimol,
Among my relatives and friends that I visited all except those in agriculture seem to be doing ok. Many of these have jobs or professionals like doctors or are businessmen or contractors. When I was kid, having about 10 acres of property in coastal A.P. (where there is water facility) was considered good. Now, even those with ten acres seem to be looking for part time jobs outside. Some of the rice farmers have turned to Eucalyptus farming for more reliable income.One nephew manages 35 acres and another is tenant farmer. Both say that they just get by. I also spoke to some agricultural labourers (in the course of examing a micro-finance project), two friends (one of them with a Ph.D in economics) who are hobby farmers, some professors of agriculture from Acharya N.G. Ranga University. In addition I visited D. Rama Naidu Institute for Rural Development in Tuniki. Rama Naidu like Ramoji Rao comes from a farming family and both seem to be contributing a bit to the farming community. Ramoji Rao manages a subsidized magazine "Annadatha" for farmers, the diary which comes with it has the addresses of various govt. depts and organizations related to agriculture. He also has an excellent daily programme on ETV which, according to the friend with economics Ph.D, has been doing more for farmers than many govt. depts. Most of these are from Kamma community to which I belong. My views may be biased by them and my reading of Glenn Davis Stone.First I will confine myself to what I heard. The concensus seems to be:
1) The cost of farming has gone up with new seeds, fertilizers, pesticides and more water.
For somebody who depends on his own labour (I spoke to some agricultural labourers who want to lease land for farming), the minimum cost for one acre for rice growing is around 10,000 rupees. For those who employ others, labour costs are higher than before.
2)The research support and advice with new technology is not easily available (govt. organizations do not work well and need bribes), conflicting advice from businessmen and NGOs committed to self sustaing agriculture. So farmers learn from others who experiment or are adventurous.
3)The returns are still weather dependent and indebtedness grows with failure and interest rates are very high. In villages they seem to start with 20 percent per annum and usually the interest is subtracted before the loan is given (That is if you borrow 10,000 rupees, you get only 8,000 in hand). The govt. schemes ,if any, involve bribes.
4) No guaranteed prices. Where there are minimum support prices, they do not seem good enough. Farmers sell when prices are low and buy the lentils etc they need at high prices.
5)The cost of labour has gone up and the quality has gone down. Some attribute this to drinking with shops in almost every village. The govt. seems to be quite happy with the revenue and unlikely to make any change. I heard that one chief minister had a target for new year drinking revenue.
These are the sort of comments that I heard. The general feeling is that prices are controlled by middlemen and that the politicians and govt. servants respond better to those with money. In spite of farmers' voting power, the others would like cheap food. With some rice farmers turning to Eucalyptus farming and other safer cash crops, some feel that there will a food crisis in the next five years. Others say that it does not matter; as long as the GDP grows, India can buy food from other countries. In Hyderabad, I have met some people who left their work as farm labourers and have come to Hyderabad to work as domestic help. They say that they are doing better now. With pollution increasing in Hyd. I am not sure about their long term prospects. But medical help is nearby if they can afford and that seems to be one reason which many retired people prefer to live in cities. One of the hobby farmers that I mentioned has his own mini plan. On part of his farm, he wants to keep accounts and make it as an example of sustainable farming and persuade some nearby villagers. He had some success 20 years ago and it is possible that he may pull it off for a few years. His wife is a doctor and he is planning on a mobile hospital for 3 days a week in the area where he is farming.
I also met some seed sellers who say that the ideas of sustainable development of DDS and such groups is anti-science and other battles with the involvement multinationals seem to be brewing. I myself feel that there is nothing wrong with GT seeds as long as they are sufficiently tested and farmers properly trained in the new technologies.
That is all for now.
With best regards,
Swarup