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“Food security act not available for vulnerable tribal groups”

“Food security act not available for vulnerable tribal groups”

tribal

Caption: National Commission for Schedule Tribes chairman Rameshwar Oraon

By Rupesh Dutta  New Delhi, (IANS) The government’s “inability” to implement the Food Security Act among the ‘Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups’ in India has resulted in a drop in their population, National Commission for Scheduled Tribes (NCST) head Rameshwar Oraon has said.

The former union minister of state for tribal affairs, who took over as chairperson of NCST in 2013, has also questioned the existence of many such PVGT communities if the government does not consider the seriousness of the issue.

“Food security is not at all available to the tribals. It is a major problem as far as the question of their existence is concerned. The government is not understanding that the PVTGs are very vulnerable community and there is a big question on their existence if the food security programme continues to elude them,” Oraon told IANS in an interview.

Recounting that when he was on a recent official visit to Garhwa district of Jharkhand, he was told that community members of Korwas and Parhaiyas were buying rice at Rs.20-30 per kg, a steep price for the poor communities.

“I was shocked to hear that members of PVTG communities were buying their staple food –rice — at Rs.20-30 per kg. They are supposed to get all this at a very low rate under the Food Security Act. This is too costly for communities who neither have any permanent source of income nor any help from the government for economic empowerment,” said Oraon, 69, who belongs to the Congress and was MoS Tribal Affairs during the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) rule.

The Particularly vulnerable tribal group (PVTG) (earlier known as Primitive tribal group) is a government of India classification created with the purpose of enabling improvement in the condition of certain communities with particularly low development indices.

The Jharkhand leader, who became a politician after relinquishing a career with the Indian Police Service, also said the NCST will conduct a comprehensive study of the PVTGs across the country to properly check their state of vulnerability and submit the results to the government.

“Looking at the deteriorating situation of the PVTGs, our commission will be making a comprehensive study of their problems and living conditions. We will submit the outcome to the government to comply with its recommendations. The studies available on such communities now are haphazard,” said Oraon.

Concerned about the situation, the National Human Rights Commission recently organised a two-day national conference in the national capital to look at the state-wise assessment of the action taken on the National Food Security Act, 2013.

Asked when the NCST would commence its study, the Congress leader said the process has already begun and it is at a preliminary stage.

Emphasising that over the years the tribal population in India has only witnessed “disappointment” at the hands of successive governments, he said: “Over the years only the categorization of the tribal population has changed, but not their population and their conditions. They live in backward areas, forest areas and in inaccessible areas. Education has been a dream.”

Oraon said in many ashram schools for ethnic tribals, a mid-day meal was only a dream and many times the teachers would be making the arrangements for the students’ meal with their own money.

“The arrangements are not satisfactory. I recently visited some schools and I was told that they are not getting foodgrains. The teachers were managing the foodgrains and were feeding the students. Many students have fled because they are not getting facilities,” said Oraon.

He said that tribals have received “only promises” by the government in term of implementing the Food Security Act and that the PVTGs were the worst affected.

(Rupesh Dutta can be contacted at Rupesh.d@ians.in)

Economic survey wants higher farm output for food security

Economic survey wants higher farm output for food security

farm outputNew Delhi : (IANS) The agriculture sector needs a transformation to ensure sustainable livelihood for farmers and food security for the people, the Economic Survey for 2015-16 said on Friday.

“The transformation has to be steered by raising farm productivity, investing in efficient irrigation technologies and efficient use of all inputs,” said the survey, tabled in parliament by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley.

Making note of the impact of two consecutive drought years leading to decline of farm productivity and area sown of major crops, it said: “To raise farm productivity, there is need to expand the acreage under irrigation with adoption of relevant technologies for efficient use of water through suitable pricing.”

It also advocated “more crop per drop” to improve farm output and ensure food and water security by stopping its wastage.

Asserting that farm mechanisation had to be promoted on a large scale to overcome labour shortage and improve productivity, the survey called for better equipment for each farming operation and reduce labour costs for each activity.

“With shortage of labour for agriculture operations owing to rural-urban migration, shift from agriculture to services and rise in demand for labour in non-farm activities, there is need to use labour for agriculture operation judiciously, which makes a case for farm mechanisation,” it said.

As fertiliser is a critical and expensive input to improve farm output, the survey stressed on the need to rationalise its subsidy, which accounted for 10 percent of the agriculture GDP in 2013-14.

“There is a need to rationalize fertiliser subsidy in an input, crop and region neutral format and minimize diversions,” it said.

It also noted the share of plan outlay for horticulture had increased to 4.6 percent in 12th plan period from 3.9 percent in the ninth plan, and during 2013-14, horticulture production was 284 million tonnes from 24.2 million hectares.

Out of categories – fruits, vegetables, flowers, aromatic plants, spices and plantation crops, the highest annual growth of 9.5 percent was in fruit production while that of vegetables shot up to 1,67,058 tonnes.

“India witnessed 18 percent increase in acreage in horticulture crops compared to five percent increase in food grains over five years (from 2010-11 to 2014-15). Horticulture crops outpaced foodgrain production since 2012-13,” it said.

The survey also said that India ranked first in world milk production, contributing 18.5 percent of global output, and its per capita availability increased to 322 grammes per day in 2014-15 from 176 grammes per day in 1990-91, as against the world average of 294 gm in 2013.