On 17 th September 2020, Lok Sabha passed the three farm laws - (i) Farmer's Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Bill, 2020; (ii) Farmer's (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement of Price Assurance and Farm Services Bill, 2020; (iii) Essential Commodities (Amendment) Bill, 2020 - followed by the Rajya Sabha on 20 th September 2020. The President of India, Ram Nath Kovind, gave his assent on 27 th September 2020. First bill relaxes restrictions governing purchases and sale of farm produce, the second relaxes restrictions on stocking under the Essential Commodities Act (ECA), 1955, and third introduces a dedicated legislation to enable contract farming based on written agreements. Status of Agriculture in India Agriculture in India is without a doubt, one of the most pertinent sectors of the Indian economy. Contributi...

India is mainly an agricultural society/ country. Agriculture is the most important occupation for most of the Indian families. Agriculture is the backbone of the Indian economy and will continue to remain so for a long time (as it seems now). Indian agriculture is characterised by agro-ecological diversities in soil, rainfall, temperature and cropping season. Agriculture and its allied sector employ more than half of the workforce in the country. However, it contributes only about 17% of the GDP. Distribution of Farmland in India 86% of total farmers are small and marginal, and they only own 47% of the total agricultural land, medium farmers are 13%, and they own 44% of the land, and the rest belongs to large farmers (see figure 1). The average size of farm holdings gradually reduced from 2.58 ha to 1.57 ha (2017-18 data) due to fragmentation of landholding generations after generation. These small and marginal farmers have limited resources com...

Agriculture is a backbone of any economy, and it is the activity by which food is produced by the optimal use of territorial resources such as land and water. Agriculture in simple terms can be defined as "the cultivation and/ or production of crop plants or livestock products" . A growing global population and changing diet are driving up the demand for food. Production is struggling to keep up as crop yields level off in many parts of the world, ocean health declines, and natural resources - including soil, water and biodiversity - are stretched dangerously thin. The food security challenge will only become more difficult, as the world will need more food for the growing population. This rising concern of food security coupled with output productivity of lands and crop yields made scientist think something about smart agriculture/ climate-smart agriculture. Climate-smart Agriculture   is a revolution in the agriculture industry that helps to guide actions required to...

History of INDIA is very rich in terms of having Kingdoms, Architecture, Literature and many other things, and agriculture has always been in focus point for the economic activity. Over centuries growth of agriculture has contributed a lot in rise of civilisations. Before agriculture became the widespread activity, peoples were nomads. They roam around in search of food - hunting wild animals and gathering wild eatable plants - on daily basis. They were not settlers so they did not prosper. Eventually people learnt how to grow cereals and other edible roots, this was the turning point when they decided to settle down and live a life based on farming. Over some centuries dependence on agriculture increased heavily because of  which civilisations prosper a lot. Indus Valley Civilization (IVC) or Harappan Civilisation  (one of the several civilizations during that time period), which was situated on the bank on the river Indus, prosper because farming started producing surplus...

Agriculture has been a primary activity since the early period of the human history, and it has remained the oldest economic activity. Around two-third of the population of India is involved in agriculture and its allied activities, making it the largest livelihood provider. Most of the production by the farmers is consumed domestically and very little is exported. Agriculture is the prime source of providing work to the rural India but its contribution in the GDP is minimal. Year-by-year the contribution of agriculture and its allied allied activities in the GDP decreased from 55% in 1950-51 to 18.2% in 2013-14, which is very sad. In fact India is the largest producer, consumer and exporter of spices and spice products. India's fruit production has grown faster than vegetables! making it the second largest fruit producer in the world. India's horticulture fruits, vegetables and spices reached to a record high of 283.5 million tonnes (MT) in 2014-15. It ranks third in fa...