The marginal and small farmers are being passively sacrificed in the name of progress in India, concludes Tom Deiters who blames the occurrences of farmers’ suicides on the globalisation project while noting that the immediate causes are multiple.
Why are farmers committing suicide? To answer this question I shall try to connect the dots by connecting Chotian (in the southern Punjab district of Sangrur which has the highest rates of farmer suicides in the region and therefore the answer to the causes of these farmer suicides could partially be found in this village) with India and world. Through the case study of Chotian I have demonstrated that the farmer suicides have multiple causes. The suicides in Punjab are the result of mental stress and this mental stress is most often caused by poverty and especially by indebtedness.
Indebtedness and the inability to earn enough income to relief the debt will assault the farmers feeling of self-esteem and respect. In many cases the individuals who committed suicide where responsible for the income and this debt created the feeling that they were incapable of taking care of their loved ones and themselves. This feeling has brought shame upon them and might even have confirmed for them the idea of being backward or underdeveloped. Once this has entered their minds it accumulates and creates a heavy mental burden. It is important to note that it is most likely that most farmers who committed suicide probably blamed themselves for their poverty and indebtedness.
Here I would like to redirect this personal blame of these farmers towards the development. project and globalisation. project that had been introduced as part to modernise these backward. farmers. The introduction of the Green Revolution and the introduction of the new High Yielding Variety Seeds (HYVs) coupled with capital intensive modern implements have increased the burden of debt immensely. Although the Green Revolution. had brought the major achievement of food self sufficiency, this agricultural development strategy came at severe costs, as we have concluded in our case study of Punjab.
The introduction of these new High Yielding Varieties (HYVs) of seeds led to loss of crop variety and the diversity of the indigenous agriculture system was replaced by a narrow genetic based on monoculture The Green Revolution focused mainly on international traded grains, which meant strategically eliminating mixed and rotational cropping. This technology dominated type of farming was supposed to bring the sluggish backward Indian farmer into the modern world. The use of chemicals was promoted and it has led to intensification of land use which in its turn has led to the destabilisation of the natural balance, social balance and the balance within the farmers themselves. The disturbance of the natural balance has resulted in an increase in pest, water logging, salinity, shortage of water, poisoning of the waterways, logging of trees and it has reduced soil fertility, biodiversity and animal life. The disturbance in the social balance in society has led to breaking up of traditional values and individualization of families. The newly introduced farming system has increased costs of production which in turn has led to the indebtedness and the disturbance of the harmony within farmers themselves. We can draw a lesson from these suicides as these acts are showing us that the agricultural system that had been introduced as part of a .development. project has failed for especially the weaker parts of Indian society i.e. agricultural labourers, marginal and small farmers.
From 1997 onwards the occurrences of farmer suicides where rising rapidly throughout India. This sudden mushrooming of the occurrences of farmers suicides are related to the globalisation project.. More and more farmers were becoming indebted part because of the withdrawal of institutional credit from the rural areas as a result of the deregulation and the privatisation of the banking sector. This decision has limited especially the marginal and small farmers in their credit sources and they have become virtually
completely reliant upon the informal sector for their credit needs. Globalisation has also diminished subsidies and price support given to farmers which has affected their income negatively. The prices that farmers would receive for their crops on the open market are often less then the cost of production, bringing structural loss. As a result of the withdrawal from the government in food purchasing prices in the open market did not reflect the local situation of availability but reflected international prices which are artificial. An example of this is the high price of cotton on the international market which caused for many farmers in Punjab and other areas to switch to cotton. What these farmers did not realise is that international prices for agricultural commodities are highly volatile and they tend to fluctuate.
Thus when the prices fell and some harvests also failed because of various pest and untimely rains these farmers were in deep distress and many of them committed suicide. At the heart of the agricultural crisis and the farmers suicides are the raising costs of production. The costs of seeds, pesticides, fertilisers and machinery are too much to bear for marginal and small farmers still these farmers will purchase these inputs because they do not wish to be .backward.. The companies who sell these agricultural products together with the moneylenders are the ones who are benefiting from this agricultural system. These agricultural companies are in large part multinationals who are gaining more and more foothold in the Indian rural areas as a result of the liberalisation of agriculture in concordance with the Agreement on Agriculture. These companies are given subsidies by the Indian government to build the infrastructure that will enable them to make huge profits and tap into the huge Indian and Asian market. Eventually the wealth accrued in agriculture will be concentrated into the hands of few international agricultural corporations. Liberalization and the commercialization of agriculture has already been the death of many farmers throughout Punjab, India and the world and by further opening up agricultural markets, the Government is signing the death sentence for its marginal and small farmers.
The government is clearly aiming towards an export orientated agricultural system
which will imply that farmers will be forced to diversify towards .high-value. products for export. The fallacy of the export orientated diversification model of agriculture is that the reason and intention why the Government wants this type of diversification is because of the potential export earnings. The foundation of the new path for agriculture is therefore based on macro-economic reasoning, just like the reasoning for the .green revolution., which does not seem to take into account the micro-economic, social, cultural and environmental implications. This type of diversification is not taking into account the real needs and interests of the primary producers. The Government of India is again making the same mistake it made in the .Green Revolution., whereby they are forcing a top down technocratic-economic solution on farmers. During the Green Revolution the aim was raising production for self-sufficiency and the current neo-liberal agricultural policy introduced in the 1990.s has the objective of raising production for exports earnings. The parallel between the .Green Revolution. and the current diversification for export policy becomes even more apparent if we are to consider that both of these policies were steered and imported from outside of India, and therefore were completely disassociated with the agricultural strengths and reality of India.
The Indian government is slowly committing Indian farmers with an on average operational landholding of one hectare, with farmers of the Western world with holdings exceeding 1000 hectares from most parts (Arlagh, 2003). This huge discrepancy in opportunity and power between Indian and Western farmers gives us to question the sanity of Indian policymakers. The government solutions to the agricultural crisis are flawed because they are only thinking of changing the structure of the agricultural system a little without ever coming to the core of the crisis and thereby this crisis for marginal and small farmers will be perpetuated. The government just as it did in the .Green Revolution. is again looking for .technological fixes. to raise production and for top down solutions that have been created outside their own borders and outside the local context of the agricultural diversity of India .
Thereby the approach of the government to the agricultural crisis in India is not based on
solving the agricultural crisis and aiding the marginal and small farmers, in essence they are denying their existence and the government is merely planning to phase out these farmers in the name of economic .progress. and growth. It seems that the government has not learnt from the failures of the .Green Revolution. and is prepared to make the same mistakes again.
In India the marginal and small farmers are being passively sacrificed in the name of progress. and policymakers with their lack of creativity and their narrow economic thinking are unable or maybe unwilling to resolve this major crisis although it is happening right underneath their eyes. There need not be a one track solution to the agrarian crisis and steps should be taken that fit the profile of the diverse needs of small and large farmers. Modern farming and focus on marketing might bring prosperity to a few farmers but it is not the solution for all farmers. The first and utmost important step to take at this stage of the crisis is to reduce the costs of production of farmers and a good method of doing this is to have farmers switch to organic farming which can if properly guided, bring down the costs to zero furthermore in the Western world there is fast growing market for organic produce and fair trade agriculture.
In any case if the negative atmosphere and the agriculture crisis are to be relieved, it will be important to look at those people who might be capable of bringing the positive change. Those people who are able to move beyond personal motifs and are truly involved and moved by the human tragedy that is occurring on a day to day basis. This would mean that we need to look beyond government, as they seem incapable and to entrenched to create such a positive move. The change must come from inspired individuals and organisations that work from the grassroots and in participation with the villagers to find solutions for the problems. Such a change should break through clogging traditions and include all villagers young and old, women and men. Only if there is a situation of openness can positive change grows.
(Conclusion of the final thesis ‘Signing the death sentence of Indian farmers - The implications of development strategies and neoliberal globalisation for small and marginal farmers in India’ submitted to University of Amsterdam)
Why are farmers committing suicide? To answer this question I shall try to connect the dots by connecting Chotian (in the southern Punjab district of Sangrur which has the highest rates of farmer suicides in the region and therefore the answer to the causes of these farmer suicides could partially be found in this village) with India and world. Through the case study of Chotian I have demonstrated that the farmer suicides have multiple causes. The suicides in Punjab are the result of mental stress and this mental stress is most often caused by poverty and especially by indebtedness.
Indebtedness and the inability to earn enough income to relief the debt will assault the farmers feeling of self-esteem and respect. In many cases the individuals who committed suicide where responsible for the income and this debt created the feeling that they were incapable of taking care of their loved ones and themselves. This feeling has brought shame upon them and might even have confirmed for them the idea of being backward or underdeveloped. Once this has entered their minds it accumulates and creates a heavy mental burden. It is important to note that it is most likely that most farmers who committed suicide probably blamed themselves for their poverty and indebtedness.
Here I would like to redirect this personal blame of these farmers towards the development. project and globalisation. project that had been introduced as part to modernise these backward. farmers. The introduction of the Green Revolution and the introduction of the new High Yielding Variety Seeds (HYVs) coupled with capital intensive modern implements have increased the burden of debt immensely. Although the Green Revolution. had brought the major achievement of food self sufficiency, this agricultural development strategy came at severe costs, as we have concluded in our case study of Punjab.
The introduction of these new High Yielding Varieties (HYVs) of seeds led to loss of crop variety and the diversity of the indigenous agriculture system was replaced by a narrow genetic based on monoculture The Green Revolution focused mainly on international traded grains, which meant strategically eliminating mixed and rotational cropping. This technology dominated type of farming was supposed to bring the sluggish backward Indian farmer into the modern world. The use of chemicals was promoted and it has led to intensification of land use which in its turn has led to the destabilisation of the natural balance, social balance and the balance within the farmers themselves. The disturbance of the natural balance has resulted in an increase in pest, water logging, salinity, shortage of water, poisoning of the waterways, logging of trees and it has reduced soil fertility, biodiversity and animal life. The disturbance in the social balance in society has led to breaking up of traditional values and individualization of families. The newly introduced farming system has increased costs of production which in turn has led to the indebtedness and the disturbance of the harmony within farmers themselves. We can draw a lesson from these suicides as these acts are showing us that the agricultural system that had been introduced as part of a .development. project has failed for especially the weaker parts of Indian society i.e. agricultural labourers, marginal and small farmers.
From 1997 onwards the occurrences of farmer suicides where rising rapidly throughout India. This sudden mushrooming of the occurrences of farmers suicides are related to the globalisation project.. More and more farmers were becoming indebted part because of the withdrawal of institutional credit from the rural areas as a result of the deregulation and the privatisation of the banking sector. This decision has limited especially the marginal and small farmers in their credit sources and they have become virtually
completely reliant upon the informal sector for their credit needs. Globalisation has also diminished subsidies and price support given to farmers which has affected their income negatively. The prices that farmers would receive for their crops on the open market are often less then the cost of production, bringing structural loss. As a result of the withdrawal from the government in food purchasing prices in the open market did not reflect the local situation of availability but reflected international prices which are artificial. An example of this is the high price of cotton on the international market which caused for many farmers in Punjab and other areas to switch to cotton. What these farmers did not realise is that international prices for agricultural commodities are highly volatile and they tend to fluctuate.
Thus when the prices fell and some harvests also failed because of various pest and untimely rains these farmers were in deep distress and many of them committed suicide. At the heart of the agricultural crisis and the farmers suicides are the raising costs of production. The costs of seeds, pesticides, fertilisers and machinery are too much to bear for marginal and small farmers still these farmers will purchase these inputs because they do not wish to be .backward.. The companies who sell these agricultural products together with the moneylenders are the ones who are benefiting from this agricultural system. These agricultural companies are in large part multinationals who are gaining more and more foothold in the Indian rural areas as a result of the liberalisation of agriculture in concordance with the Agreement on Agriculture. These companies are given subsidies by the Indian government to build the infrastructure that will enable them to make huge profits and tap into the huge Indian and Asian market. Eventually the wealth accrued in agriculture will be concentrated into the hands of few international agricultural corporations. Liberalization and the commercialization of agriculture has already been the death of many farmers throughout Punjab, India and the world and by further opening up agricultural markets, the Government is signing the death sentence for its marginal and small farmers.
The government is clearly aiming towards an export orientated agricultural system
which will imply that farmers will be forced to diversify towards .high-value. products for export. The fallacy of the export orientated diversification model of agriculture is that the reason and intention why the Government wants this type of diversification is because of the potential export earnings. The foundation of the new path for agriculture is therefore based on macro-economic reasoning, just like the reasoning for the .green revolution., which does not seem to take into account the micro-economic, social, cultural and environmental implications. This type of diversification is not taking into account the real needs and interests of the primary producers. The Government of India is again making the same mistake it made in the .Green Revolution., whereby they are forcing a top down technocratic-economic solution on farmers. During the Green Revolution the aim was raising production for self-sufficiency and the current neo-liberal agricultural policy introduced in the 1990.s has the objective of raising production for exports earnings. The parallel between the .Green Revolution. and the current diversification for export policy becomes even more apparent if we are to consider that both of these policies were steered and imported from outside of India, and therefore were completely disassociated with the agricultural strengths and reality of India.
The Indian government is slowly committing Indian farmers with an on average operational landholding of one hectare, with farmers of the Western world with holdings exceeding 1000 hectares from most parts (Arlagh, 2003). This huge discrepancy in opportunity and power between Indian and Western farmers gives us to question the sanity of Indian policymakers. The government solutions to the agricultural crisis are flawed because they are only thinking of changing the structure of the agricultural system a little without ever coming to the core of the crisis and thereby this crisis for marginal and small farmers will be perpetuated. The government just as it did in the .Green Revolution. is again looking for .technological fixes. to raise production and for top down solutions that have been created outside their own borders and outside the local context of the agricultural diversity of India .
Thereby the approach of the government to the agricultural crisis in India is not based on
solving the agricultural crisis and aiding the marginal and small farmers, in essence they are denying their existence and the government is merely planning to phase out these farmers in the name of economic .progress. and growth. It seems that the government has not learnt from the failures of the .Green Revolution. and is prepared to make the same mistakes again.
In India the marginal and small farmers are being passively sacrificed in the name of progress. and policymakers with their lack of creativity and their narrow economic thinking are unable or maybe unwilling to resolve this major crisis although it is happening right underneath their eyes. There need not be a one track solution to the agrarian crisis and steps should be taken that fit the profile of the diverse needs of small and large farmers. Modern farming and focus on marketing might bring prosperity to a few farmers but it is not the solution for all farmers. The first and utmost important step to take at this stage of the crisis is to reduce the costs of production of farmers and a good method of doing this is to have farmers switch to organic farming which can if properly guided, bring down the costs to zero furthermore in the Western world there is fast growing market for organic produce and fair trade agriculture.
In any case if the negative atmosphere and the agriculture crisis are to be relieved, it will be important to look at those people who might be capable of bringing the positive change. Those people who are able to move beyond personal motifs and are truly involved and moved by the human tragedy that is occurring on a day to day basis. This would mean that we need to look beyond government, as they seem incapable and to entrenched to create such a positive move. The change must come from inspired individuals and organisations that work from the grassroots and in participation with the villagers to find solutions for the problems. Such a change should break through clogging traditions and include all villagers young and old, women and men. Only if there is a situation of openness can positive change grows.
(Conclusion of the final thesis ‘Signing the death sentence of Indian farmers - The implications of development strategies and neoliberal globalisation for small and marginal farmers in India’ submitted to University of Amsterdam)
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