House panel calls for all-crop insurance

While the Narendra Modi-led NDA government claims to have introduced the “best” crop insurance scheme in the form of Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojna (PM Crop Insurance Scheme), a parliamentary panel in its report has called upon the Centre to be bolder and make it universal to cover all crops across the country against the current coverage of rabi and kharif crops.

The panel has also advocated an integrated credit-crop-livestock health insurance package for all farmers, which might boost farmers’ income levels in the long run.

Congress MP Veerappa Moily-led parliamentary panel has noted in its report on the newly-launched Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojna that the crop insurance should be extended to cover all crops and across the entire country instead of restricting the coverage to selective crops and specific seasons like Kharif and Rabi.

The current crop insurance scheme, launched with the current Kharif crop season, allows farmers to insure their sowings with just a premium of 2 per cent, while for Rabi crops it’s only 1.5 per cent.

The Centre and the states will share the rest of the cost 50:50.

The government has estimated that the annual cost would be around Rs 7700 crore, but sources said that the cost would cross Rs 10,000 crore as a large number of farmers in Uttar Pradesh have gone in for insuring their crops.

The panel, in its report, expressed concern that despite crop insurance being mandatory for farmers who took loans, the coverage was still very low due to lack of enforcement.

“The committee would therefore expect the government, insurers, RBI and NABARD to make concerted efforts to enforce the compulsory provision of the scheme,” noted the panel in its report.

With the Prime Minister having set a target for the government to double farmers’ income in the country by 2022, the panel has sought an integrated approach to achieve the aim.

“There is also a need to increase the risk-bearing capacity of farmers by promoting integrated farming comprising livestock, animal husbandry, fish-breeding in land-locked areas, pisciculture and associated crop insurance so that servicing of debt becomes self-sustaining, the panel added.

The committee would thus recommend an integrated and comprehensive credit-crop-livestock health insurance package for all farmers,” added the panel.