Farmers write to PM, want stalled talks to resume

NEW DELHI: Almost four months after talks between the government and protesting farm groups broke down, the Samyukt Kisan Morcha, a platform of farm unions, wrote to Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday, asking the Union government to resume dialogue to end the agitation, but remained steadfast on their demand to scrap the agri legislations.

Farmers have been protesting at five sites in large camps near Delhi’s borders and at Shahjahanpur on the Rajasthan-Haryana border, demanding the rollback of three laws passed in September last year to lift restrictions on trade in farm produce.

The protests have sparked concerns of a potential spread of Covid-19, but the farmers have refused to give up the agitation, citing it as a matter of livelihood.

“Mr Prime Minister, this letter is to remind you that, as the head of the government of the largest democracy in the world, the onus of resuming a serious and sincere dialogue with the farmers lies with you,” the letter signed by major farm leaders states.

So far, 11 rounds of talks between 40 farm leaders and the government have failed to resolve the crisis. Both the government and farmers called off the series of discussions on January 22, citing lack of progress.

“The government is always ready to talk to farmers. The prime minister and the agriculture minister have said this in Parliament and outside,” said an agriculture ministry official, requesting anonymity.

NEW DELHI: Rising agricultural exports from India, which shipped out a record 20 million tonne of foodgrains in 2020-21, have breathed new life into agribusinesses, but farmers say they have hardly gained because they had to sell cheap. The beneficiaries were large agricultural trading firms.

In the financial year ended March 2021, the country exported farm produce worth nearly $42 billion, a growth of about 18%, on the back of a rise in global commodity prices, official statistics show.

The current boom is nearly of the same level seen in 2013-14, when exports peaked. India’s farm exports grew five times from just $8.7 billion in 2004-05 to $42.6 billion during 2013-14. They then fell sharply to $33 billion in 2016-17 and have been muted since.

The country exported 17.72 million tonnes of rice till March 30. It also sold nearly 3 million tonnes of wheat and a similar amount of maize abroad.

A firming up of global sugar prices, good news for India, the world’s second largest producer of the sweetener, prompted the government on Thursday to cut the subsidy on sugar exports from ₹6,000 a tonne to ₹4,000.

Growing demand around the world for food staples such as rice, wheat and sugar are keeping Indian agriculture businesses and processing plants humming, as the pandemic began to ease in many nations.

However, the issue is that farmers have gained the least.

International food commodity prices rose for the 11th consecutive month in April, with sugar and cereals “resuming their upward trend”, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) said on May 6. FAO’s Food Price Index in April rose 30.8% higher than its level in the same month last year. “A key reason for the surge of exports, especially in cereals, is that Indian produce has been very competitive (in terms of pricing) vis-à-vis countries like Australia and Thailand,” said Abhishek Agrawal of Comtrade, a commodities trading advisory firm.

Competitive pricing simply means Indian exporters were able to offer cheaper prices to international buyers than their rivals. Moreover, rice producer Thailand’s shipments fell due to the drought and Vietnam too had a smaller crop in 2020. Indian exporters filled the gap.

“Indian wheat is selling for about $280 a tonne (1000 kg), about 6% less than what competitors from Ukraine and Australia are asking,” said Vishal Tomar, who owns a wheat aggregator business in Indore.

This rate for wheat exports is nearly the same as the minimum support price (MSP) of ₹1975 a quintal (100kg). Analysts say this means the producer or farmer was likely paid much below MSP rates.

Sunil Singh, a farmer from Bihar’s Arariya district, said he sold wheat for ₹1600 a quintal. “That was the highest rate available,” he said over phone.