As the forest cover has thinned, more and more people have come to depend upon agriculture for survival and support… But
with no access to
irrigation - and lacking in state support - the timely onset of the monsoon is essential to a majority of farmers in the rainfed areas of the country
. And there are no alternatives if the rains fail (such as changing the crop sown to less water intensive crops such as gram, sorghum and millet) as only corn and wheat are available from the Public Distribution System. The reason why the villagers have switched to water-intensive crops like paddy and wheat is because they fetch a higher price in the market; and government policy favors these crops.
The government policy mostly consists of bringing more and more areas under intensive irrigation; a legacy of the Green Revolution. Subsidies on fertilizers, water and power - and the ready availability of credit - have reduced the cost of production for farmers with irrigation facilities, but failed to improve matters for farmers who grow crops under rainfed conditions. As a result there has been a shift in the cropping patterns of rainfed areas with commercial crops such as cotton, soybean and groundnuts replacing staple cereals.
Whereas the cost of inputs (such as labor, fertilizer and seeds) has increased greatly, the yield has been stagnant for the past five years. Adding to the farmers woes is the fact that groundwater tables in many districts have gone down.
Food security and productivity in the coming years will increasingly depend upon improved utilization of the rainfed (or unirrigated) areas. But the Green Revolution based model of increasing productivity is failing; as hybrid seeds, chemicals and mechanical inputs are not suited to rainfed farming. In other words, the rainfed areas in the country require an approach to agricultural development that differs markedly from the Green Revolution strategy. Further, crops must be suitable to the local agro-climatic zones in which they are grown, and market access of rainfed crops needs to be improved. More livestock are also needed to provide an alternate livelihood to farmers during periods of drought or scanty rain.