The rural development is inevitable for the development of India’s growth, understanding the aspects of the agricultural landscape there is an elevating realisation that the idea of clustering and agriculture efficiency go hand-in-hand. The coronavirus pandemic has forced us to rethink our rural development model. Our country has a humongous rural population and thus directing them towards the right thing will foster growth.
The billionaire Gautham Adani opinionated that the growth in our country will only be on the right track if a proper developing model is designed for the local population for their employment. He addressed the future of India, the students of Anand-based Institute of Rural Management in Gujarat and stated about the need in adopting digital technologies to promote agriculture and food processing units. India has a huge population of migrant workers which exceeds over 100 million and it is beneficial. If there is rural-urban imbalance it will reflect the inequality of opportunities which must be spoken. We still remember the images of lakhs of migrant people moving to their villages among Covid-19 crisis. This COVID crisis is making us think about new needs and wants on how to tackle the issues faced. In any economy it is the employability of people which should be given utmost consideration and, in our country, the local population is very high. Thus, we have to rethink the structure and develop a new model. Adani who leads the largest conglomerate in India cited the example of Israel that took learnings from a rural kibbutz-based culture along with modern technology and made self-reliance an absolute mantra.
India has already head started as the world’s largest producer of pulses, fruits like mango, banana, papaya, milk and then second-largest producer of wheat, rice, groundnut, sugarcane and cotton and the vision of Atmanirbhar will transform farmers into entrepreneurs. The challenges are also not small like overgrazing, shrinking arable land as a result of over-cultivation, climate change, water availability, shortage of value-adding processing facilities concerning location and numbers.
India is a group of 700 districts and each one can be self-reliant micro cluster. These clusters are important for the small-scale producers and agri-business people to achieve value-addition, higher productivity, minimise wastage and eliminate the middlemen. The future trade, health system and supply chains will be different but India will continue its journey to be the largest economy by the year 2030. Even after India being the 2nd largest food producer-only less than 10 per cent of total production is handled into value-added products. If we compare other developing countries, it is as much as 75 per cent. He also opinionated that the main reasons for our country’s low food processing numbers are the deficiency of processing facilities at the right locations. This will impact storage, price realisation and wastage.
