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Punjab Agriculture
Punjab’s economy, including its agriculture, has been in crisis for some time on various fronts. But the pandemic provided an opportunity to the state government to set up an expert committee to suggest measures for rolling out a medium- and long-term strategy for the revival of the state economy. This article provides critical commentary on the various recommendations of the committee to deal with the agrarian crisis and presents an alternative perspective.
It is well known that Punjab agriculture has been in crisis for quite some time, including on economic, environmental and social sustainability fronts, and solutions have eluded it for various reasons. However, unlike in the past, the Government of Punjab (GoP) has proactively set up a committee of experts under Montek Singh Ahluwalia, to suggest a strategy for revival of the state economy in the post-COVID-19 medium- and long-term scenario. The committee has just submitted its first report and is scheduled to deliver the final report very soon. If this first report is anything to go by, then the portents are very clear. The report, which takes a multisectoral approach to build resilience and recovery, aims at opening up the state economy to the private sector, especially the agricultural sector in all possible ways. But, it does so without going into any documentation and analysis of the impact of COVID-19 on the state’s economy and its implications for future livelihoods of the people. This article focuses on the recommendations of the committee on the agricultural sector as that is the most crisis-ridden, crucial, and controversial sector of the Punjab economy from a policy angle.
Crop Diversification
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