In the last couple of weeks, new developments have shown that drought has severely impacted India's agricultural sector. But this has failed to grab major headlines until recently, when the situation became especially dire.
The situation should call attention to the still-pressing needs of India's farmers, who are less able to benefit from the economic expansion that has made India an emerging hub for call centers, software development and other "business processes." India largely remains an agricultural country - agriculture, forestry and fishing account for 17 percent of GDP - and should therefore promote the development in rural areas as much as it should focus on its "knowledge" sector, which generates more wealth and investment but also employs far fewer people.
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3 years ago
2 comments:
Nice title! The difference seems so stark when you place those names side by side: call centers to plowshares. For the detriment of agriculture, unfortunately it seems like as society has advanced, "farming" has become equated with a trade of the past, whereas, advancement, globalization, knowledge, adjectives such as that have been used to describe call centers, making it more appealing for a nation to be strong in that front.
Its also a shame that India will have to increase its imports of an internally producible good, money which could be used to support the nation itself.
From an economists perspective, what do you think India could change to help change the trend in the agricultural economy, like raising the minimum required prices or export/import requirements?
nice post.
I am reading Development as Freedom by Amartya Sen, written 10 years ago but as true now as ever. He tackles the misconception that overall increases in GDP constitute development - that if some sectors of society (in this case farmers) are not able to benefit from the fruits of growth, society is not developing at all.
Allowing the agriculture sector to benefit from the fruits of growth in other sectors means having a redistributionist government, having public policy instituted that spreads the increased wealth to all areas, which India has always lacked, ever since Nehru.
@ Mamta - agree that call centres etc have flourished at the expense of agriculture, but (and I'm no economist here...!) tarrifs and quotas seem to be less attractive than ensuring the economy is more mixed by increasing the purchasing power of those at the bottom of society - i.e. by redistributing wealth through progressive taxation and public works. But if this isn't possible in the UK, I somehow doubt India will take such measures!!
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