India has a huge opportunity to boost its agricultural industry and increase exports, according to the Indian Merchants’ Chamber (IMC).
“Farming needs to get more attention,” says Deepak Premnarayen, the president of the IMC, which represents businesses and is headquartered in Mumbai.
“The agro-based industry here has a tremendous opportunity. For example, we don’t export bananas but we are the largest producer of bananas in the world.”
By putting the necessary logistics and facilities in place, India could capitalise on its agricultural production and create more jobs.
“To me, agriculture is important because of job creation and it is important to stop the exodus to the urban areas and also it is a strong economic power,” Mr Premnarayen says.
But farming has been negatively affected by two consecutive years of bad monsoon rain and many parts of India have been affected by drought. This season’s monsoon rains are forecast to be much better.
Mr Premnarayen says the chamber is taking steps to help farmers and address the issues of water shortages.
“We are working with the government to tell farmers don’t grow [water-intensive] sugar cane alone in Latur [one of the parts of the country hardest hit by drought in recent months] and finding ways to grow sugar cane with less water,” he says.
The IMC, in June, set up an initiative with the state government of Maharashtra to provide 500 million rupees (Dh27.34m) worth of seeds for free to farmers who had defaulted on crop loans.
About 500,000 farmers are expected to benefit from the initiative.
Half the cost of the seeds is being borne by the seed companies and half by the state government.
business@thenational.ae
Follow The National's Business section on Twitter
