Farmer suicide in india

Agriculture sector has a pivotal role in Indian economy.

The share of agriculture sector in G.D.P. of India was

44.0% during 1973-74 .

Agriculture provides the principal means of livelihood for

over 60 percent of India's population.

In Indian planning agriculture sector ignored except in a

few five years plan.

6/8/2017 Sethupathi S , M.Sc (soil science) 2

History

In the 1990s the Govt. officials denied a large number of

suicides, but as more and more information came to light the

government began to accept that farmers in India were under

considerable stress 15% farmers killed themselves and

more than 25000 farmers consumed pesticides and killed

themselves because of a combination of high farming costs

(exorbitantly priced hybrid (so-called high yielding) seeds

and pesticides sold by multinationals and a lack of a good

price for their produce, partly due to imports.


Farmers’ Suicide Statistics

On an average 38 farmers commit suicide everyday in India, one

Indian farmer commits suicide every 32 minutes between 1997 and

2005 and since 2012, this has become one suicide every 30

minutes.

1803 women farmers committed suicide in 2012.

13754 farmers committed suicide in the country in 2012.

Almost 75 per cent of farmer suicides have occurred amongst the

small and medium farmers.

Indebtedness was the reason behind the suicide of 93% farmers.




Maharashtra is India’s farm suicide epicentre

Nearly half of all suicides by cultivators in 2014

were in Maharashtra alone, with Telangana following.


The number of suicides went up, not down

The number of suicides went up, not down

In 2014, India recorded 12,360 farm suicides. This is

slightly more than the number of farmer suicides registered

in 2013, but in general there is a slow decline in the number

of officially recorded farm suicides.

6/8/2017 8


New Delhi, Jul 29 Nearly 363 farmers have committed suicide so far in 2016

due to agrarian reasons and the Centre is taking steps to make farming a viable

business to curb such instances in future, Parliament was informed today.

The House was also informed that states take appropriate steps, with agriculture,

including farm indebtedness, being a state subject. However, the Centre supplements

their efforts through appropriate policy measures and budgetary support.

According to data placed by Minister of State for Agriculture,363 farmer suicides have

been reported so far in 2016 due to agrarian reasons.

The minister made it clear that this data have been furnished by states and not by the

National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB). NCRB has published such data till 2014

only. Of the total number of farm suicides, a maximum of 241 have been reported in

Karnataka, followed by Maharashtra (57) and Punjab (56), the data showed. In 2015,

the number of such cases stood at around 107 in Karnataka, 1,841 in Maharashtra and

46 in Punjab, while the overall figure for the entire country was 2,548,

363 farmer suicide cases reported so far in 2016

Common Features In Majority Of

Suicides

• 91-94 % of suicides are by family heads.

• 91-97 % of those who committed suicide are males.

• 84 to 89 percent are married.

• 86.5 percent of farmers who took their own lives

were financially indebted.



indebtedness, 93%, 24%

economic downfall, 74%,

19%

conflict in family, 55%, 14%

crop failure, 41%, 11%

dent in social status, 36%, 10%

daughter/sister's marriage, 34%, 9%

addiction, 28%, 7%

health promblems, 21%,

6%

Drought

• The most immediate

consequence of drought is a

fall in crop production, due to

inadequate and poorly

distributed rainfall.

• Farmers are faced with

harvests that are too small to

both feed their families, fodder

supplies from crop residues to

feed their livestock and fulfill

their other commitments

forcing them to drastic

measures. The drastic measures can include

changing jobs or suicides.6/8/2017 Sethupathi S , M.Sc (soil science) 12

Monsoons

Farmers in India over dependence on

the monsoons.

There is regular break down in the

meteorological cycle of rainfall,.

In India, 93% of area fall under dry

land farming, which means totally

dependent on the rainfall as irrigation

systems are scarce, not equally spread

and are not efficient

Sometimes more than normal rains causes flood which also

destroys the crop.


Lack of proper irrigation

Indian farmers are heavily dependent

on monsoons,. They don’t have any

source for proper irrigation farming.

Irrigation farming is when crops are

grown with the help of irrigation

systems by supplying water to land

through rivers, reservoirs, tanks,

and wells.

58% of farmers having committed

suicides had absolutely no

irrigation facilities.


Groundwater

Due to overdependence on

groundwater for all purposes

domestic or industrial and with

no law against it in India,

ground water table is decreasing

at an alarming rate.

Many farmers due to lack of

proper irrigation systems, use

tube wells and are now facing

problems due to it.


Lack Of Power Supply

Many tasks related to

agriculture are power/electric

dependent.

Costly or no electricity

supply proves to a significant

problem.


Expensive technologies

New technologies are better but they

come with a big price tags, which are

either too costly to be bought or they

get their money through loans which

again push them into debt.


Misguided Policies

Government only help a fraction of

farmers.

The waiver given by government

helps only if the loan has been

taken from a government-backed

institution, but most farmers in

India borrow from moneylenders at

the start of the sowing season to

buy seeds and other ingredients.

Farmers' demands were not

taken into count while

preparing the relief package.

Neither were civil society

organizations, local

government bodies, panchayats

etc consulted.6/8/2017 Sethupathi S , M.Sc (soil science) 18

Girl child

• Dowry is still present in

many parts of India.

• Dowry creates

financial pressure on

the family head.


Green revolution


Indebtedness

Indebtedness was the reason behind the suicide of 93% farmers.

Out of 17.64 Lakh farmers only (25.3%) farmers could avail

institutional finance in 2005-06.

Private money lenders charge high interest rates between 48-60%

p.a.

Higher rate of interest in the cooperative credit system e.g. up to

12.5% to 14% till last year.

cooperative sector brought down their interest rates to 7%, even then

the farmers are taking loans from the private individuals.


Reasons for indebtedness


Indebtedness

Increasing cost of agriculture inputs

Repeated crop loss

Increasing dependence on

money lenders at high rates of interest.

Withdrawal of government support

Reduced price of agriculture produces

Crop failure

There are many different reasons

for crop failure

Late Monsoon

Heavy Monsoon

Pests, Insects

Natural Calamity

Personal Enmity

Climate Change

Drought


others

Social Status

Loan Waiver Policy

Neutral seeds

Rising Costs of Cultivation

Uncertainty of agricultural enterprise in India

Media’s Move


Impact of Suicides

Suicides leads to loss of sole bread winner in the family.

Widows burdened with the new responsibility as the sole breadwinner.

It causes a lot of psychological distress to family.

There is increased social stigma.

Impact on children’s education.

Other family members attempting suicides.

Children sometimes lose both parents to suicide, forcing their education to a

halt, especially if they have to work in order to provide for their needs.

Farms are confiscated due to inability to pay back high interest loans.

There is also loss of assets i.e. domestic animals and agriculture implements.

The families moves from farm labor to permanent labor.

This also leads to child labor and detoriation of physical health


Preventive Measures

1. Agriculture extension services .

2. Provide financial literacy ( how to use credit, work out on cost-

benefit analysis of investment, risk coping mechanism i.E.,

Insurance – crop & life, increasing savings).

3. Building social systems & strengthening them ( farmer’s groups

exposure to different coping mechanisms, best agriculture

practices).

4. Focus on creating alternate livelihoods.

5. Encourage multiple cropping.

6. Generate awareness on pesticide usage.

7. Provide timely government input subsidy to the farmers.

8. Provide quality of seeds.

9. Government in advance should state the premium price for the

crops.


Rehabilitative Measures

• Counselling can be provided to the farmer’s family

• The families can be helped to gain benefits of various

government schemes.

• Dependent family members can be provided with guidance to

other livelihood alternatives(non farm employment) and

• Seed support, manure, tank silt (red soils) or cost of cultivation

can be provided.

• Interest free loan and free health insurance services are also

required.


What government can do?

Immediate Measures

• Immediate compensation for crop failure

• Remunerative prices, direct procurement from

farmers

• Modify export/import policies and tariffs in

favour of Indian farmers

• Provide ex-gratia and loan repayment support

for all families of farmer suicides in time-

bound manner



Addressing Root Causes

• Price Compensation system for all food

crops: when MSPs or market prices are less

than Target Price (Cost of Cultivation + 50%),

the difference should be paid directly to

farmers

• Guarantee minimum living incomes to all

farmers

• Promote sustainable agriculture which

reduces cost of cultivation and crop risk

• Comprehensive rainfed agriculture mission

based on diverse cropping systems, protective

irrigation and livestock systems6/8/2017 Sethupathi S , M.Sc (soil science) 29


Addressing Root Causes (contd)

• Bank credit to all farmers with adequate scale

of finance

• Effective crop insurance to cover all crops

and all farmers

• Inclusion of tenant farmers in all support

systems



• Day-long joint session of

Assembly/Parliament to discuss farmer

suicides and agrarian crisis

• Constitute a Parliamentarians’/MLAs’ Forum

on Agrarian Distress to address the causes of

the crisis



Reference

• Indian today, magazine

• The hindu

• Images from google


Farmer suicide in india

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