What is the author’s suggestion to provide aid to farmers? ?->(Show Answer!)

1. What is the author’s suggestion to provide aid to farmers?

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MCQ-> Read the following passage carefully and answer the question given below it. Certain words have been printed in bold to help you locate them while answering some of the questions.Agriculture has always been celebrated as the primary sector in India. Thanks to the Green Revolution, India is now self-sufficient in food production. Indian agriculture has been making technological advancement as well. Does that mean everything is looking bright for Indian agriculture ? A superficial analysis of the above points would tempt one to say yes, but the truth is far from it. The reality is that Indian farmers have to face extreme poverty and financial crisis, which is driving them to suicides. What are the grave adversities that drive the farmers to commit suicide, at a time when Indian economy is supposed to be gearing up to take on the world ?Indian agriculture is predominantly dependent on nature. Irrigation facilities that are currently available, do not cover the entire cultivable land. If the farmers are at the mercy of monsoons for timely water for their crops, they are at the mercy of the government for alternative irrigation facilities. Any failure of nature, directly affects the fortunes of the farmers. Secondly, Indian agriculture is largely an unorganized sector, there is no systematic planning in cultivation, farmers work on lands of uneconomical sizes, institutional finances are not available and minimum purchase prices of the government do not in reality reach the poorest farmer. Added to this, the cost of agricultural inputs have been steadily rising over the years, farmers’ margins of profits have been narrowing because the price rise in inputs is not complemented by an increase in the purchase price of the agricultural produce. Even today, in several parts of the country, agriculture is a seasonal occupation. In many districts, farmers get only one crop per year and for the remaining part of the year, they find it difficult to make both ends meet.The farmers normally resort to borrowing from money lenders, in the absence of institutionalized finance. Where institutional finance is available, the ordinary farmer does not have a chance of availing it because of the “procedures” involved in disbursing the finance. This calls for removing the elaborate formalities for obtaining the loans. The institutional finance, where available is mostly availed by the medium or large land owners, the small farmers do not even have the awareness of the existence of such facilities. The money lender is the only source of finance to the farmers. Should the crops fail, the farmers fall into a debt trap and crop failures piled up over the years give them no other option than ending their lives.Another disturbing trend has been observed where farmers commit suicide or deliberately kill a family member in order to avail relief and benefits announced by the government to support the families of those who have committed suicide so that their families could at least benefit from the Government’s relief programmes. What then needs to be done to prevent this sad state of affairs ? There cannot be one single solution to end the woes of farmers.Temporary measures through monetary relief would not be the solution. The governmental efforts should be targeted at improving the entire structure of the small wherein the relief is not given on a drought to drought basis, rather they are taught to overcome their difficulties through their own skills and capabilities. Social responsibility also goes a long way to help the farmers. General public, NGOs, Corporate and other organizations too can play a part in helping farmers by adopting drought affected villages and families and helping them to rehabilitate.The nation has to realize that farmers’ suicides are not minor issues happening in remote parts of a few states, it is a reflection of the true state of the basis of our economy.What does the author mean by “procedures” when he says that ‘farmers do not get a chance of availing institutional finance because of procedures involved in it’ ?
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MCQ-> Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions given below it. Certain words/phrases are printed in bold to help you to locate them while answering some of the questions. The outside world has pat answers concerning extremely impoverished countries, especially those in Africa. Everything comes back, again and again, to corruption and misrule. Western officials argue that Africa simply needs to behave itself better, to allow market forces to operate without interference by corrupt rulers. Ye the critics of African governance have it wrong. Politics simply can't explain Africa's prolonged economic crisis. The claim that Africa's corruption is the basic source of the problem does not withstand serious scrutiny. During the past decade I witnessed how relatively well-governed countries in Africa, such as Ghana, Malawi, Mali and Senegal, failed to prosper, whereas societies in Asia perceived to have extensive corruption, such as Bangladesh, Indonesia and Pakistan, enjoyed rapid economic growth. What is the explanation? Every situation of extreme poverty around the world contains some of its own unique causes, which need to be diagnosed as a doctor would a patient. For example, Africa is burdened with malaria like no other part of the world, simply because it is unlucky in providing the perfect conditions for that disease; high temperatures, plenty of breeding sites and particular species of malaria-transmitting mosquitoes that prefer to bite humans rather than cattle.Another myth is that the developed world already gives plenty of aid to the world's poor. Former U.S. Secretary of the Treasury, Paul O'Neil expressed a common frustration when he remarked about aid for Africa : "We've spent trillions of dollars on these problems and we have damn near nothing to show for it". O'Neil was no foe of foreign aid. Indeed, he wanted to fix the system so that more U.S. aid could be justified. But he was wrong to believe that vast flows of aid to Africa had been squandered. President Bush said in a press conference in April 2004 that as "the greatest power on the face of the earth, we have an obligation to help the spread of freedom. We have an obligation to feed the hungry". Yet how does the U.S. fulfill its obligation? U.S. aid to farmers in poor countries to help them grow more food runs at around $200 million per year, far less than $1 per person per year for the hundreds of millions of people living in subsistence farm households.From the world as a whole, the amount of aid per African per year is really very small, just $30 per sub- Saharan African in 2002. Of that modest amount, almost $5 was actually for consultants from the donor countries, more than $3 was for emergency aid, about $4 went for servicing Africa's debts and $ 5 was for debt-relief operations. The rest, about $12, went to Africa. Since the "money down the drain" argument is heard most frequently in the U.S., it's worth looking at the same calculations for U.S. aid alone. In 2002, the U.S. gave $3 per sub-Saharan African. Taking out the parts for U.S. consultants and technical cooperation, food and other emergency aid, administrative costs and debt relief, the aid per African came to grand total of 6 cents.The U.S. has promised repeatedly over the decades, as a signatory to global agreements like the Monterrey Consensus of 2002, to give a much larger proportion of its annual output, specifically upto 0.7% of GNP, to official development assistance. The U.S. failure to follow through has no political fallout domestically, of course, because not one in a million U.S. citizens even knows of statements like the Monterrey Consensus. But no one should underestimate the salience that it has around the world. Spin as American might about their nation's generosity, the poor countries are fully aware of what the U.S. is not doing.The passage seems to emphasize that the outside world has
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MCQ-> Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions given below it. Certain words have been printed in bold to help you locate them while answering some of the question. Political ploys initially hailed as master-strokes often end up as flops. The Rs. 60,000 crore farm loan waiver announced in the budget writes off 100% of overdues of small and marginal farmers holding upto two hectares, and 25% of overdues of larger farmers. While India has enjoyed 8%-9% GDP growth for the past few years, the boom has bypassed many rural areas and farmer distress and suicides have made newspaper headlines. Various attempts to provide relief (employment guarantee scheme, public distribution system) have made little impact, thanks. to huge leakages from the government’s lousy delivery systems. So, many economists think the loan waiver is a worthwhile alternative to provide relief. However the poorest rural folk are landless labourers, who get neither farm loans nor waivers. Half of the small and marginal farmers get no loans from banks and depend entirely on money-lenders, and will not benefit. Besides, rural India is full of the family holdings rather than individual holdings and family holdings will typically be much larger than two hectares even for dirt-poor farmers, who will, therefore, be denied the 100% waiver. It will thus fail in both economic and political objectives. IRDP loans to the rural poor in the 1980s demonstrated that crooked bank officials demand bribes amounting to one-third the intended benefits. Very few of the intended beneficiaries who merited relief received it. After the last farm loan waiver will Similarly slow down fresh loans to deserving farmers. While overdues to cooperatives may be higher, economist Surjit Shalla says less than 5% of farmer loans to banks are overdue i.e. overdues exist for only 2.25 million out of 90 million farmers. If so, then the 95% who have repaid loans will not benefit. They will be angry at being penalised for honesty. The budget thus grossly overestimates the number of beneficiaries, It also underestimates the negative effects of the waiver-encouraging willful default in the future and discouraging fresh bank lending for some years. nstead of trying to reach the needy, through a plethora of leaky schemes we should transfer cash directly to the needy using new technology like biometric smart cards, which are now being used in many countries, and mobile phones bank accounts. Then benefits can go directly to phone accounts operable only by those with biometric cards, ending the massive leakages of current schemes. The political benefits of the loan waiver have also been exaggerated since if only a small fraction of farm families benefit, and many of these have to pay bribes to get the actual benefit, will the waiver really be a massive vote- winner? Members of joint families will feel aggrieved that, despite having less than one hectare per head, their family holding is too large. Lo qualify for the 100% waiver. Alliance ministers, of central or state governments, give away freebies in their last budgets, hoping to win electoral regards, Yet, four-fifth of all incumbent governments are voted out. This shows that beneficiaries of favours are not notably grateful, while those not so favoured may feel aggrieved, and vote for the opposition. That seems to be why election budgets constantly fail to win elections in India and the loan waiver will not change that pattern.Why do economists feel that loan waivers will benefit farmers in distress?
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MCQ-> Direction : Read the following passage carefully and answer the questions given below it. Certain words/phrases have been printed in bold to help you locate them while answering some of the questions.Governments have traditionally equated economic progress with steel mills and cement factories. While urban centers thrive and city dwellers get rich, hundreds of millions of farmers remain mired in poverty. However, fears of food shortages, a rethinking of antipoverty priorities and the crushing recession in 2008 are causing a dramatic shift in world economic policy in favour of greater support for agriculture. The last time when the world's farmers felt such love was in the '70s. At that time, as food prices spiked, there was real concern that the world was facing a crisis in which the planet was simply unable to produce enough grain and meat for an expanding population. Governments across the developing world and international aid organisations plowed investment into agriculture in the early '70s, while technological breakthroughs, like high-yield strains of important food crops, boosted production. The result was the Green Revolution and food production exploded. But the Green Revolution became a victim of its own success. Food prices plunged by some 60% by the late '80s from their peak in the mid- '70s. Policymakers and aid workers turned their attention to the poor's other pressing needs, such as health care and education. Farming got starved of resources and investment. By 2004, aid directed at agriculture sank to 3.5% and 'Agriculture lost its glitter'. Also, as consumers in high-growth giants such as China and India became wealthier, they began eating more meat, so grain once used for human consumption got diverted to beef up livestock. By early 2008, panicked buying by importing countries and restrictions slapped on grain exports by some big producers helped drive prices upto heights not seen for three decades. Making matters worse, land and resources got reallocated to produce cash crops such as biofuels and the result was that voluminous reserves of grain evaporated. Protests broke out across the emerging world and fierce food riots toppled governments. This spurred global leaders into action. This made them aware that food security is one of the fundamental issues in the world that has to be dealt with in order to maintain administrative and political stability. This also spurred the U.S. which traditionally provisioned food aid from American grain surpluses to help needy nations, to move towards investing in farm sectors around the globe to boost productivity. This move helped countries become more productive for themselves and be in a better position to feed their own people. Africa, which missed out on the first Green Revolution due to poor policy and limited resources, also witnessed a 'change'. Swayed by the success of East Asia, the primary poverty?fighting method favoured by many policymakers in Africa was to get farmers off their farms and into modern jobs in factories and urban centers. But that strategy proved to be highly insufficient. Income levels in the countryside badly trailed those in cities while the FAO estimated that the number of poor going hungry in 2009 reached an all time high at more than one billion. In India on the other hand, with only 40% of its farmland irrigated, entire economic boom currently underway is held hostage by the unpredictable monsoon. With much of India's farming areas suffering from drought this year, the government will have a tough time meeting its economic growth targets. In a report, Goldman Sachs predicted that if this year too receives weak rains, it could cause agriculture to contract by 2% this fiscal year, making the government's 7% GDP-growth target look 'a bit rich'. Another green revolution is the need of the hour and to make it a reality, the global community still has much backbreaking farm work to do.Direction: Choose the word/group of words which is most similar it meaning to the word printed in bold as used in the passage. STARVED
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MCQ-> The income disparity in the new India is massive: 36 billionaires in India and 800 million people living on less than $2 a day. The challenge for achieving inclusive growth relates to the revival of agriculture. Farming is becoming a non-viable activity. A confluence of factors, from poor rainfall to the new availability of consumer goods which consume much of Indian familie's incomes, has driven many farmers into crushing debt. The agriculture sector has many problems with a growth rate of less than 2% in the last decade. Further scope for increase in net sown area is limited. Disparity in productivity across regions and crops has persisted. Far from benefiting from the economic boom, many complain that banks don't offer the rural poor credit, forcing them to turn to greedy money-lenders, who typically charge up to 20% interest on a four-month loan. Healthcare and education costs have risen dramatically, while the global price of cotton has become depressed, largely due to the billions of dollars in subsidies Washington hands out to U.S. farmers. The approach to the revival of Indian agriculture seems to be incremental, rather than a holistic strategy. It is important to stress that growth and equity should be pursued simultaneously rather than following the 'growth first and equity next' approach. What are the challenges for achieving 4% growth and equity in agriculture? Policy makers like the National Commission on Farmers mention cost reduction in agriculture as important to compete in a globalised world. The most important problem for the farmers is output price fluctuations. There is a big gap between producer prices and consumer prices. In order to protect farmers from National and international price volatility, a price stabilization fund is needed. The supply and demand side constraints have to be removed to raise growth. The support systems have to be tuned to improve productivity and incomes of farmers with emphasis on small and marginal farmers and dry land areas. One of the differences between the green revolution in the 1960s / 70s and the present 'second green revolution' is that risk is higher in the latter approach as it has to concentrate more on dry-land areas. Trade liberalisation has also raised the risk and uncertainty. Thus, policymakers have to keep in mind the increasing risk in agriculture. Agriculture policies have to be gender sensitive too since the share of women is increasing. The Government is aware that the crop sector may not be able to grow at 4% per annum but horticulture and allied activities like dairying, poultry and fisheries have to grow at the rate 6 % to 7 % to achieve 4% growth in agriculture. Investment in irrigation and rural infrastructure is important for agricultural growth. It is known that public investment in agriculture is lower than the requirements needed for achieving 4% growth. Bharat Nirman Programme is in the right direction but the progress has to be much fasterWhat does the author view as a challenge for achieving inclusive growth?
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