Bills Introduced in Lok Sabha to Transform the Agriculture

September 15, 2020

Union Minister of Agriculture & Farmers’ Welfare, Rural Development & Panchayati Raj, Shri Narendra Singh Tomar introduced – The Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, 2020 and the Minister of State for Consumer Affairs, Food & Public Distribution, Shri Raosaheb Patil Danve introduced The Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill, 2020 in the Lok Sabha on September 14, 2020. The bills are aimed at transforming the agriculture besides raising farmers’ income

The Farmers (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, 2020

The bill seeks to provide a national framework on farming agreements.
It will protect and empower farmers to engage with agri-business firms, processors, wholesalers, exporters or large retailers for farm services.
It will also enable the farmers to sale the future farming produce at a mutually agreed price in a fair and transparent manner.
Background for the Bill- Indian agriculture is highly fragmented because of its small holding sizes. Further, it is highly weather dependent and there exists production uncertainties and market unpredictability. As a result, agriculture is highly risky and inefficient in respect input & output management. Thus, the bill has been introduced that will transfer the risk of market unpredictability from the farmer to the sponsor. It will reduce marketing costs and improve farmers income.

The Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill, 2020

This bill seeks to remove commodities like edible oils, cereals pulses, oil seeds, onion and potatoes from the list of essential commodities.
It will remove fears of private investors regarding the regulatory interference in their operations.
The bill will provide farmers the freedom to produce, hold, move, distribute and supply.
Background – Though, India has surplus agri-commodities in most of the cases, farmers still are unable to get better prices. It is because of poor investment in storage and processing facilities. The bill has been introduced to pull investment in cold storage and modernization of food supply chain.

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