NEW DELHI, 20 December 2007 — Prime Minister Manmohan Singh yesterday expressed hope that the Indian farm sector will expand by four percent in the next five years even as he called for targeted measures to address livelihood and food security.
“The slowing down of agricultural growth to less than two percent per annum since late 1990s has undoubtedly been the root cause of much of the rural distress,” the prime minister told a meeting of the National Development Council (NDC) here.
“I am happy to say we have already taken several steps to restore momentum to this sector,” he said, adding: “With these measures, we hope that we will be able to sustain the desired growth rate of four percent in agriculture.”
The prime minister told the NDC meeting, which is meeting to give its nod to the Rs.36.44 trillion 11th Five Year Plan, that along with farm growth it was also important to address the impending problem of food security.
“The next decade is going to be one in which our food security will be under stress,” he said, adding India needed to focus on enhancing productivity since it has the second largest arable area in the world.
In this context, he also emphasized a paradigm shift on how the country manages its food stocks and the government’s own procurement strategies, even as a need may arise to consider buffers for edible oils and lentils.
“We probably need to realize that we are going to be importers of some food items for many years and take steps to manage this in a structured manner,” he said, adding food doles are targeted at the needy and leakages needed to be arrested.
Describing the prospects of overall growth as encouraging, Manmohan said, “Growth has averaged close to 9 percent per annum in the last three years of the tenth plan, thus more than making up for a slow start in the first two years.”
Terming the good growth performance as “unprecedented,” he said, “It is possible that with the correct set of policies and dedicated effort by both the central and state governments, we will not only be able to maintain this momentum of high growth in future but may also be able to raise it to 10 percent per annum. This is what the eleventh plan aims at during the next five years.”
Expressing his concern over the slow reduction in poverty, Manmohan said: “High growth has not made as much of an impact on poverty reduction as we would have liked. Poverty is coming down, but not fast enough.” He pointed specifically to “too many people” still lacking basic services including education, health, housing and clean drinking water.
