Institutional Credit to Agriculture Sector in India: Status, Performance and Determinants

The institutional credit has been conceived to play a pivotal role in the agricultural development of India. A large number of institutional agencies are involved in the disbursement of credit to agriculture. However, the persistence of money lenders in the rural credit market is still a major concern. In this backdrop, the present study has examined the performance of agricultural credit flow and has identified the determinants of increased use of institutional credit at the farm household level in India. The study based on the secondary data compiled from several sources, has revealed that the institutional credit to agriculture in real terms has increased tremendously during the past four decades. The structure of credit outlets has witnessed a significant change and commercial banks have emerged as the major source of institutional credit in recent years. But, the declining share of investment credit in the total credit may constrain the sustainable agricultural growth. The quantum of institutional credit availed by the farming households is affected by a number of socio-demographic factors which include education, farm size, family size, caste, gender, occupation of household, etc. The study has suggested simplification of the procedure for a better access to agricultural credit of smallholders and less-educated/illiterate farmers.Agricultural and Food Policy,

Securities Regulation -- Fraud to Include Nondisclosure

Bihar has a large agrarian economy of over Rs 250 billion with more than 80 percent of rural population subsisting on farming. Agricultural work force increased more than two-fold from 126 lakh in 1981 to 265 lakh in 2006 whereas net sown area declined by about one lakh hectares and gross cropped area has been stagnating at 80 lakh hectares during the period. Due to increase in number of agricultural labour force in Bihar, per agricultural worker annual real productivity (at 1980 prices) has declined from Rs 1977.00 in 1980-81 to Rs 1278.00 in 2005-06. Among the major states in India, Bihar is at the lowest ladder in terms of proportion of institutional loan to total loan disbursement to farmers. The high indebtedness to money lenders may be an important reason for indifferent attitude of farmers towards lending institutions, resulting in low investment and low productivity in Bihar. An assessment of the situation at ground level indicates that recourse to non-institutional credit continues to dominate as far as rural areas and agriculture sector are concerned. The study recommends interest rate on co-operative agricultural loans be reduced to 3 per cent in Bihar for benefit of farmers. It will motivate farmers to approach cooperatives for agricultural loans who are still not inclined to contact commercial bank branches. Agricultural insurance offers protection against losses caused by fluctuations in the output of a crop from one year to another or from one crop season to another. Its objective is to stimulate and support the production of principal crops in the country. Providing financial support to farmers in the event of crop failure, it makes farmers credit-worthy for the next crop season. It has been observed that the majority of small and marginal farmers, as well as tenant farmers and farm laborers bear the brunt of crop failure. However, the performance of National Agricultural Insurance Scheme has also been unsatisfactory in Bihar. Despite change in form of crop insurance scheme and establishment of Agricultural Insurance Company Ltd. the regional disparities in crop insurance still persist. It is accordingly recommended that a campaign be launched in rural areas to create awareness among farmers about crop insurance involving, inter alia, non-loan taking farmers because a large number of farmers are still not in a position to avail crop loan facility from institutional agencies in Bihar

Changing behaviour of self help group members: Pathway for sustainable rural livelihoods in Eastern India

The study evaluates the behaviour construct of self help group (SHG) members. Data were solicited from randomly selected 100 SHG members of Patna district, Bihar, India at two point of time (in before and after situation), i e during 2008 and 2013. The behaviour construct developed, consisted of 30 items, for which Cronbach’s alpha coefficient of reliability was observed as 0.82. Data were solicited on three-point continuum, viz. No Change=1, Slightly Changed=2 and Highly Changed=3. The mean values of two situations (before and after situation) were compared (z-statistics) to observe the behavioural change among the SHG members. An improvement of 34.91% between pre (46.09%) and post evaluation (81%) and a significant improvement in behaviour of SHG members was observed, which exemplifies the impact of SHG approach in instilling a positive behavioural orientation. Positive behaviour could play a great role in tackling the issues of rural poverty for improving sustainable livelihood security in eastern India. To achieve this rural livelihoods must assimilate the vital facets like (i) formation and stabilization of SHGs, (ii) pro-poor financial and credit support system, (iii) market-driven and decentralized extension system, (iv) diversification towards high-value enterprises,(v) technological intervention and impact assessment, (vi) media-mix for technology transfer, (vii) frequent educational tour/visits and interaction with other SHGs and research institutes, (viii) developing leadership skills, and (ix) strong political will. Nevertheless, extension system needs to be re-oriented and revitalized with new agricultural knowledge base in emerging technologies and methodologies

An Analysis of Women’s Participation in Agriculture in Bihar

Understanding the nature of rural landscape change during the urbanization process is vital to formulate rural management plans for sustainable development. However, there is little information on how rural landscapes changes and limited evidence as to how it can be improved. There were 244.9 million households in India of which 179.7 million households or 833 million people were in rural areas (SECC Survey 2011). Survey revealed that 87.2 million rural households reported one of more criteria of deprivation, while 92 million households were engaged in casual manual labour and agricultural activities. In agriculture, the role of women cannot be denied. They contribute in every operation of agricultural activities and are also active in allied sectors like cattle management, dairying, beekeeping, goat rearing mushroom production and poultry farming etc. Women participation in total workforce was assessed 27.44% as against 72.56% by male workforce in 2011. Share of women agricultural workforce in total workforce was computed to be 16.57% in 2001 which declined to 6.23% in 2011. Causes of decline may be their participation other sectors with improvement in their literacy rate which rose to 51.50% in 2011 as compared to 33.57% in 2001. The male-female sex ratio has registered a decline of 0.11% as compared to 2001 census. Women holding land account for only 13.31% as against 87.27% by men in Bihar. Share of women agricultural workforce in total agricultural workforce was estimated to be 19.32% as per census 2011. Analysis of CACP unit level data of Bihar for the year 2013-14, revealed that the contribution of women in agricultural activities was assessed to be 35.94%. Women’s contribution in agriculture is significant and plays diverse role, still their wages were found 7.04% less than their male counterparts during 2015-16. To strengthen women’s participation in agriculture and allied sectors and to improve their access to land, loan and other facilities, Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare has policy provisions like joint leasing for both domestic and agricultural land under National policy for farmers. Under credit facility provisions government has framed policy for issuing Kisan Credit Cards to women for creating livelihood through livestock practices and agricultural processing. Beside all efforts, there is still a wide gender gap in the state which may be addressed properly for overall development of women and enhancing the rural landscape of the state in particular and nation in general. The paper tries to analyze the role women in agricultural development of Bihar and the issues confronting them

An Analysis of Women’s Participation in Agriculture in Bihar

Understanding the nature of rural landscape change during the urbanization process is vital to formulate rural management plans for sustainable development. However, there is little information on how rural landscapes changes and limited evidence as to how it can be improved. There were 244.9 million households in India of which 179.7 million households or 833 million people were in rural areas (SECC Survey 2011). Survey revealed that 87.2 million rural households reported one of more criteria of deprivation, while 92 million households were engaged in casual manual labour and agricultural activities. In agriculture, the role of women cannot be denied. They contribute in every operation of agricultural activities and are also active in allied sectors like cattle management, dairying, beekeeping, goat rearing mushroom production and poultry farming etc. Women participation in total workforce was assessed 27.44% as against 72.56% by male workforce in 2011. Share of women agricultural workforce in total workforce was computed to be 16.57% in 2001 which declined to 6.23% in 2011. Causes of decline may be their participation other sectors with improvement in their literacy rate which rose to 51.50% in 2011 as compared to 33.57% in 2001. The male-female sex ratio has registered a decline of 0.11% as compared to 2001 census. Women holding land account for only 13.31% as against 87.27% by men in Bihar. Share of women agricultural workforce in total agricultural workforce was estimated to be 19.32% as per census 2011. Analysis of CACP unit level data of Bihar for the year 2013-14, revealed that the contribution of women in agricultural activities was assessed to be 35.94%. Women’s contribution in agriculture is significant and plays diverse role, still their wages were found 7.04% less than their male counterparts during 2015-16. To strengthen women’s participation in agriculture and allied sectors and to improve their access to land, loan and other facilities, Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare has policy provisions like joint leasing for both domestic and agricultural land under National policy for farmers. Under credit facility provisions government has framed policy for issuing Kisan Credit Cards to women for creating livelihood through livestock practices and agricultural processing. Beside all efforts, there is still a wide gender gap in the state which may be addressed properly for overall development of women and enhancing the rural landscape of the state in particular and nation in general. The paper tries to analyze the role women in agricultural development of Bihar and the issues confronting them

Effect of salt stress on expression of carotenoid pathway genes in tomato

Carotenoids, the naturally occurring isoprenoids form essential components of photosynthetic antenna and reaction centre complexes. Thus they play a significant role in absorption, dissipation and transfer of light energy for the process of photosynthesis. The effects of salt stress on carotenoid gene expression in tomato leaves were studied. For that tomato plants were subjected to different concentration of salt water. Morphological characters such as plant height, no. of fruits per plant, chlorophyll content and expression of four major carotenoid pathway genes such as phytoene synthase, phytoene desaturase, zeta carotene desaturase and lycopene beta cyclase were analysed. The quantitative expression analysis using real time PCR has shown a decrease in the expression of all the studied genes as the salt concentration increased. Among the different concentrations of NaCl used for the experiment, it was seen that 200 mM was most detrimental for the carotenoid gene expression. Lycopene beta cyclase, the enzyme that converts lycopene to beta carotene was seen to be highly affected compared to other genes studied showing a 1.87 fold inhibition in its expression at 200 mM NaCl

COLD BEAM INJECTION IN RELATIVISTIC EMEC WAVE FOR KAPPA DISTRIBUTION FUNCTION WITH AC FIELD FOR MAGNETO-PLASMA

The effect of cold electron beam on electromagnetic electron cyclotron (EMEC) wave has been studied by using the unperturbed Lorentzian (Kappa) distribution in the magnetosphere for relativistic plasma. The dispersion relation is obtained by using the method of characteristic solutions and kinetic approach. An expression for the growth rate of a system has been calculated. It is inferred that in addition to the relativistic plasma obliquity and effect of cold electron beam modifies the growth rate and it also shifts the wave band significantly. The relativistic electrons by increasing the growth rate and widening the bandwidth may explain a wide frequency range of EMEC wave emissions in the magnetosphere

A Note on Indian Agricultural System vis-à-vis ATMA Model

During the past 60 years, the Indian extension system has evolved to reflect national priorities. At the same time, malnutrition and poverty continue to be persistent problems for the rural poor. The major issues before Indian extension system are: how to improve the effectiveness of extension systems? How to serve the small land holders and marginal farmers in diversified farming systems, and proper allocation of funds, human resources and its management? The World Bank funded Innovations in Technology Dissemination (ITD) component of National Agricultural Technology Project (NATP) focused on bottom-up planning process for technology assessment, refinement and dissemination in order to make the whole extension system demand-driven and farmer accountable. This has helped to strengthen research and extension capabilities, restructure public extension services and test new institutional arrangements for technology transfer with the involvement of all the stakeholders of Government and Non-Government agencies at the district level

Sustainable Agriculture: Potential and Strategies for Development

We can ignore the state of global and national land and water resources only at our great peril. We tend to assume that environmental degradation is a contemporary condition, but there is historical evidence to show that cultures rise and fall on their agricultural base’s ability to support the rest of society. The balance between population and agricultural productivity becomes more and more precarious as a society becomes more complex and the drive for a continuing food supply to support all the non-producers places more and more demands upon land and water resources. We now face a scenario in which global exploitation of resources has expanded a local environmental phenomenon into a world-scale problem. Already, 6% of the earth’s surface is classified as extreme desert, and a further 29% is subject to varying degrees of desertification. Any expansion in the extent or intensity of agricultural production would require sustainable management of the land-water-vegetation system. The paper discussed the issues and strategies which may find an answer to ensure sustainable development of agricultural sector in India

Sustainable Agriculture: Potential and Strategies for Development

We can ignore the state of global and national land and water resources only at our great peril. We tend to assume that environmental degradation is a contemporary condition, but there is historical evidence to show that cultures rise and fall on their agricultural base’s ability to support the rest of society. The balance between population and agricultural productivity becomes more and more precarious as a society becomes more complex and the drive for a continuing food supply to support all the non-producers places more and more demands upon land and water resources. We now face a scenario in which global exploitation of resources has expanded a local environmental phenomenon into a world-scale problem. Already, 6% of the earth’s surface is classified as extreme desert, and a further 29% is subject to varying degrees of desertification. Any expansion in the extent or intensity of agricultural production would require sustainable management of the land-water-vegetation system. The paper discussed the issues and strategies which may find an answer to ensure sustainable development of agricultural sector in India