Agriculture
Maharashtra’s
Agribusiness and Rural Transformation
- 25 Jan 2020
- 3 min read
Why in News
Recently, the Union government, Maharashtra and the World Bank (WB) signed a loan agreement of $210 million to support small farmers participate in competitive agriculture value chains, facilitate agri-business investments, increase market access and productivity, and build the resilience of crops to recurrent floods or droughts in Maharashtra.
Key Points
- It is a significant step towards transforming the state's rural economy through sustainable agriculture and empowerment of farmers by connecting them directly to the markets and doubling agriculture exports from the state.
- This project is also in line with the National Action Plan on Climate Change (2008).
- Maharashtra Agribusiness and Rural Transformation Project will help:
- Enhance the adoption of climate-resilient production techniques in the state.
- Increase private sector investments in agricultural value chains.
- Remove constraints for producers and entrepreneurs in accessing emerging domestic and export markets.
- Capacity-building of state to respond to commodity-price fluctuations by providing access to timely information on markets.
- Focus on Women:
- At least 43% of farmers and farm-workers participating in project activities are expected to be women.
- Specific focus will be given to women-led enterprises and the participation of women in the decision-making processes of farmer producer organizations.
Maharashtra and Agricultural Transformation
- Agricultural transformation is already underway in Maharashtra with an upsurge in the production of high-value crops such as fruits and vegetables, pulses, and maize and soybean for animal feed.
- The state has emerged as one of the country’s largest producer and exporter of fruits, vegetables, pulses, cotton, and soybean.
- But, the area under cultivation for cereals such as rice and wheat has been declining since 2000.
- Many of these changes have led to several positive developments for Maharashtra where production is:
- labour intensive in horticulture and floriculture.
- climate-resilient (pulse-based cropping systems increases resilience, e.g. pigeon pea intercropping leads to higher soil carbon sequestration than mono-crop system)
- Responds to domestic and global market needs.
- With a substantial urban population, relatively high per capita incomes, and highest industrialization levels, Maharashtra is well-placed for an agriculture-sector transformation.
