Record production of food grains in 2016-17, reveals govt’s data

New Delhi: Union agriculture and farmers welfare minister, Mr Radha Mohan Singh has revealed that as per the Third Advance Estimates, the food grain production in the country has increased to 273 MT in 2016-17, oil seeds to 32.5 MT, and sugarcane to 306 MT.  Fruits and Vegetable production has increased to 287 MTs, according to the Second Advance Estimate. He said that there has been a record production of food grains in 2016-17 and all previous records were broken.

The agriculture minister made these remarks during the National Summit on Smart Agriculture Marketing Solutions to Double the Farmers Income organised in Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry FICCI.  The representative from Rajasthan, Haryana, Assam, Goa, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Bihar also participated in the conference.

Mr Singh said that only through cross-pollination of expertise and innovations and thereafter synergy during implementation of the programs conceived we would be able to achieve the goal set for the country by Prime Minister, through his farsightedness, of doubling farmers’ income by 2022.

As per the Second Advance Estimates, the food production increased to 273 million metric tonnes and the fruits and vegetables to 287 million metric tonnes during 2016-17.

Mr Singh said farmers have not been getting the corresponding increase in remuneration. He elaborated, “The Government is seized of the urgent requirement of strengthening market systems to reduce post-harvest losses to enable farmers to tide over both situations of bumper production leading to a glut and abrupt price fall and incidences of less production resulting in the availability of meagre marketable surplus.”

The agriculture minister said the approach adopted encompasses both adoptions of cost effective production and diversifying agriculture towards growing of high-value crops,  agroforestry, rearing of livestock, poultry, fisheries, etc,  as well as creating accessible and efficient markets to ensure better price realisation to the farmers through a robust value supply chain. “We empathise with the farmers and for that purpose have formulated farmer welfare centric programs and policies, which is equally related to food security and price security,” he said.

Mr Singh also emphasized that the aim of his ministry is to bring markets closer to the farms along with appropriate storage, grading and sorting facilities to reduce transportation costs, distress sale as well as the number of intermediaries so that farmers can get a larger share. He said the government is in discussion with Warehousing Development and Regulatory Authority (WDRA) on synergy with our programs so that the farmers can also avail pledge financing against the produce stored in scientific WDRA compliant warehouses.