Amid the ongoing farmers’ protest, Dr. Raghuram Rajan has some solutions that cut through the noise and addresses needs of both farmers and the government.
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00:00Punjab, which is a natural reservoir of water in the country, has to focus on, you know,
00:05other things than just the most water intensive crops.
00:10And it can have a glorious future there.
00:12You don't say my way or the highway on either side.
00:15In your book, you said that at the start of the century, Punjab was the richest state
00:20in India.
00:21It now doesn't win feature in the top 15.
00:23What is the economic solution at this point in time to what farmers are facing in Punjab?
00:30First, I think it all starts with dialogue, which is why I'm glad that dialogue is ongoing
00:35right now.
00:37You don't say my way or the highway on either side.
00:40What is also important is to recognize that the farmers themselves understand they have
00:45a problem.
00:47That we talk to, you know, some farmers who basically, you know, are saying that, look,
00:56you don't, don't you understand that we ourselves are concerned about the lack of diversification,
01:02that we are producing a really water intensive crop, for example, with rice and water is
01:09going to be harder to come by.
01:11We are digging deeper and deeper bore wells in order to get there.
01:14And the poor farmers can't dig those deep bore wells, and they have a problem.
01:19So we need to think about crop diversification, how we move away.
01:24And as Ashok Gulati, a very, you know, prominent agricultural economist has suggested, there
01:32are many crops which probably will produce more value than, say, rice or wheat.
01:40Agriculture has become a big factor.
01:44You know, milk is our most valuable agricultural or farm product, for instance.
01:52So we need to think about how farms can diversify away towards the more value added sort of
01:58instruments.
02:00And that needs technological support.
02:03That needs a certain amount of buffer.
02:06There are huge risks in moving from what is tried and tested, for which there's a, you
02:12know, an apparatus to buy, that's the MSP apparatus, to a crop for which there aren't
02:19as many supports.
02:20So we need to think about that process of movement.
02:23How do you give them reasonable alternatives?
02:26And I think a dialogue in which you provide these alternatives, and this is the alternative,
02:33and this is important for you, because you see as well as I do, climate change coming.
02:38Water is going to become scarcer and scarcer.
02:41Punjab, which is a natural reservoir of water in the country, has to focus on, you know,
02:46other things than just the most water intensive crops.
02:51And it can have a glorious future there.
02:53How do we, I mean, how do we protect farmer incomes, but in a way that also protects national
03:00strategy?
03:02And this is where a very sensible dialogue and offering, you know, listening and offering
03:11alternatives, talking to all the major political parties also, which, you know, have an interest
03:19in this, I think is a way of taking this forward.