Govt Forms Committee On MSP, To Be Headed By Former Agriculture Secy Sanjay Agrawal

The committee for Minimum Support Price (MSP), Crop Diversification and Natural Farming will be headed by former Agriculture Secretary Sanjay Agrawal.

An Indian farmer ploughs a paddy field following monsoon rain (Source: File photo/AFP)

New Delhi: To make the Minimum Support Price (MSP) system more effective and transparent as well as suggest ways to promote zero budgeting based-agriculture, the central government has constituted a committee that will consist of representatives of Central govt, state govts, farmers, agro-scientists and economists, said Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers Welfare, as reported by news agency ANI. The committee for Minimum Support Price (MSP), Crop Diversification and Natural Farming will be headed by former Agriculture Secretary Sanjay Agrawal.

Former Agriculture Secretary Sanjay Agrawal to chair the said committee on MSP, crop diversification and natural farming. pic.twitter.com/AYV62cU8bR

— ANI (@ANI) July 18, 2022

Prime Minister Narendra Modi had promised to set up the panel while withdrawing the contentious farm laws led to year-long farmer protests and sit-ins across the country.

“The entire country knows that the prime minister has announced the formation of a committee to make crop diversification, natural farming and MSP effective and transparent. The government is committed to the announcement made by the PM. The matter is under consideration of the ministry,” Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar had said in the Rajya Sabha.

The Samyukt Kisan Morcha, which is a coalition of over forty Indian farmers' unions to coordinate satyagraha against the three farm acts, has not been able to give the names of its three representatives in the mutual fight since December 2021. After waiting a long time for the name to come from their side, the government has declared a committee. 

There are names of 16 people on this committee, including experts from the agriculture and cooperative sectors. This committee will work to make MSP more effective and transparent. So that the income of farmers will increase. 

According to the notification issued by the government for this, even now three members will be included if the name comes from the Samyukt Kisan Morcha. That is, there will be a place on the committee. The government has included five names from other farmer organisations. These include the names of Gunwant Patil, Krishnaveer Choudhary, Pramod Kumar Chaudhary, Gunee Prakash and Pasha Patel. In this, the cooperative sector has also been given representation. The names of IFFCO chairman Dilip Sanghani and cooperative and agriculture expert Binod Anand are from this area.