Wednesday, January 13, 2010
The success of schemes under the MGREGA should be evaluated


Chitradurga: Lamenting the country’s failure to register four per cent growth in agriculture as targeted in the 11th Five-Year Plan, P.G. Chengappa, Vice-Chancellor, University of Agricultural Sciences (UAS), Bangalore, stated that the growth rate was still under two per cent despite pumping enormous funds into the sector. Inaugurating an awareness programme on the National Agricultural Innovative Project aimed at enhancing agricultural productivity through the Integrated Farming System (IFS), organised by the UAS, the Indian Council for Agricultural Research and the Institute of Agricultural Technologies (IAT) Centre here on Tuesday, Dr. Chengappa painted a picture of the state of agriculture in the State today based on a survey.
He said that about 90 per cent of farmers in the State were still debt-ridden. On an average, a farmer owns only 1.6 hectares of land with an annual income that is less than that of a daily wage labourer. Nearly 75 lakh families depend on agriculture in the State, and about 75 per cent of them are small and marginal farmers, he added.

Highlighting the vital factors on which the progress of agriculture depended, Dr. Chengappa said that farmers should be provided with advanced technology. It should be ensured that subsidised seeds and farming equipment reached the intended beneficiaries, and a comprehensive policy for the growth of farmers should be framed, he said.
“The UAS is implementing the IFS project with the objective of increasing revenue, and thereby improving the livelihood of farmers in Chitradurga and Bidar districts of the State, he said.
The IFS project is an initiative launched by the Union Government in 150 backward districts of the country. The IFS is a consortium of departments linked directly or indirectly to agriculture such as Animal Husbandry, Fisheries and Sericulture.

Under the scheme, Dr. Chengappa said that farmers would be encouraged to undertake alternative activities in order to generate income. “We want to make this scheme a model one, whose success will be replicated in other parts of the State,” he said.

Chitradurga Zilla Panchayat chief executive officer Rangegowda said that the implementation of schemes under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGREGA) had been a boon to farmers. The schemes had boosted the income of farmers in the summer when otherwise they would had no work or income, he said and stressed on the need to introduce a process of evaluation of the success of the schemes.