What Can Budget 2024-25 Do For India’s Agriculture?

Farmer’s welfare and boosting rural demand was one of the main highlights of interim budget 2024-25 presented by Union Minister for Finance & Corporate Affairs Nirmala Sitharaman in Parliament on February 1.The Finance Minister had said that every year, under PM-KISAN SAMMAN Yojana, direct financial assistance is provided to 11.8 crore farmers, including marginal and small farmers, while crop insurance is given to 4 crore farmers under PM Fasal Bima Yojana. She stated that these, besides several other programmes, are assisting ‘Annadata’ in producing food for the country and the world and added that the worries about food have been eliminated through free ration for 80 crore people. The interim budget 2024-25 had promised for stepping up value addition in agricultural sector and boosting of farmers’ income, promote private and public investment in post-harvest activities including aggregation, modern storage, efficient supply chains, primary and secondary processing and marketing and branding to ensure faster growth of the agriculture and food processing sector. According to the quarterly estimates for the fourth quarter (Jan-Mar), India’s real GDP growth accelerated to 7.8 per cent in Q4FY2023-24. Real GVA growth accelerated to 6.3 per cent in Q4 of FY2023-24. Industrial sector growth accelerated to 8.4 per cent and Services sector to 6.7 per cent. Agriculture, Livestock, Forestry and Fishing sectors grew to 0.6per cent in Q4 of FY2023-24. Credit for agriculture and allied activities expanded by 19.7 percent compared to 20 percent in March 2024.