The food grain production has set a new high in this year. Total production in this raid-fed Kharif season is 141.6 million tonnes in 2018-19 which is 11.9 million tonnes higher than average production of last five years. This is third consecutive year of good crop, in 2014 and 2015 agricultural sector was distressed due to droughts in many regions of the country. However, in the years of 2016, 2017, and 2018- production has been record high. In July, Government announced MSP for common variety paddy, the most important Kharif crop will be raised by Rs 200 over last year’s Rs 1,550 per quintal, which is 13 percent increase from the MSP in the previous financial year.
Good crop coupled with high MSP will certainly help farmers. Modi government has promised to double farmers income by 2022. As per estimates, production of rice, primary Kharif crop will increase by 1.8 percent to 99.2 million tonnes this year. Sugarcane, which is the main cash crop of the season will also see 2 percent growth in production. However, production of pulses is expected to be slightly lower to 9.2 million tonnes this year from 9.34 million tonnes of last year. The non-food grains, oilseeds are expected to be 5.7 percent more than last year, 22.2 million tonnes this year from 21 million last year. The only crop which will drop significantly is cotton, its production will drop to 32.5 million from 35 million last year.
The growth in production in this Kharif season will help BJP in upcoming assembly elections in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and Chhattisgarh. A good percentage of people in these states depend on agriculture for living. Agricultural growth has been good for last three successive years. Growth in agriculture is visible in the rural economy. Rural distress has been one of the major problems in initial years of the Modi government. The agriculture sector was hit hard due to successive drought for two years in the country just after the Modi government came to power. The government took active steps to minimize the effects of drought and launched many schemes for the benefit of the farmers.
To make farmers financially secure in the case of poor crop growth, the government launched Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY). To provide irrigation facilities to farmers across the country, PM Modi launched Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchai Yojana (PMKSY) and pumped money into the National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) to increase credit penetration to farmers. The efforts by the Modi government brought positive results in the field. Economic Survey 2017 predicted an agricultural growth of 4.1% for the fiscal year 2017-18. The prediction got vindicated when data released by the Central Statistics Organization (CSO) showed that the agriculture sector is reviving at a good pace. In the last quarter of the fiscal year 2017-18, growth in the sector was 4.5 percent. In the FY 2018, the country exported agricultural commodities worth $ 38.74 billion, as against imports of $ 24.89 billion which resulted in farm trade surplus of $ 13.85 billion. The surplus for 2016-17 and 2015-16 was $ 8.05 billion and $ 10.23 billion respectively. This shows a healthy revival in agriculture with the Rabi season being productive for farmers. The good crop and betterment in the condition of farmers will help BJP in getting votes from the rural population.
The BJP government will be going into elections in less than one year and the main problem for the government is to end rural distress. The party is already performing exceptionally well among rural populations, and if its tally increases in rural constituencies, it will sweep the 2019 Lok Sabha elections with a huge majority.
