The International Monetary Fund(IMF) has said India’s farm bills has the “potential to represent a significant step forward for agricultural reforms” in the country.
“We believe the farm bills do have the potential to represent a significant step forward for agricultural reforms in India,” Gerry Rice, Director of Communications at the International Monetary Fund (IMF), said.
The IMF official said the new farm bill will reduce the role of the middlemen and enhance efficiency.
“The measures will enable farmers to directly contract with sellers, allow farmers to retain a greater share of the surplus by reducing the role of middlemen, enhance efficiency and support rural growth,” Rice added.
“However, it is crucial that the social safety net adequately protects those who might be adversely impacted during the transition to this new system,” the spokesperson added.
“This can be done by ensuring that the job market accommodates those that are impacted by the reforms, and of course, the growth benefits of these reforms will depend, critically, on the effectiveness and the timing of their implementation, so need to pay attention to those issues as well with the reform,” Rice said.
IMF’s statement comes even as thousands of farmers continue their protests against the bill in the national capital belonging to Punjab and Haryana demanding repeal of the three farm laws and legal guarantee of minimum support price(MSP) for their crops.
On Thursday, farmer leaders had said they will attend the ninth round of talks with the government.
India’s Supreme Court had appointed a panel on farm laws which is likely to hold its first meeting on January 19 even as Bhartiya Kisan Union president Bhupinder Singh Mann said he is recusing himself from the four-member committee.
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