Domain B

The severe cash crunch over the past week following Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s announcement of demonetisation of high-denomination notes has hampered the sowing of rabi crops and threatens to thwart an increase in crop acreage this rabi season. In fact, the area under rabi crop has declined marginally from last year, with the last one week witnessing major retardation, in the case of wheat, the principal rabi crop.

The Financial Express

Farmers took out a protest rally here today against the Reserve Bank’s decision not to allow exchange or deposit of defunct notes at the district central co-operative banks and warned of stopping supply to Amul Milk co-operative if the restriction is not lifted in a week. Protesters on around 150 tractors and 100-odd trucks loaded with grain and sugarcane covered the 10-km stretch from Jehangirpura to the collector’s office here.

YourStory

The northern region of India is facing drought for the second consecutive year. The rainfall deficit is hovering around 35 percent in Punjab and Haryana, and data shows that the two states have consistently registered below normal rainfall since 1998, which has put a severe strain on their groundwater resource. Last year, the rainfall deficit was over 50 percent and Punjab had asked for assistance from the Centre to the tune of Rs 2,350 crore due to a 15-percent rise in irrigation costs; deepening of dried up borewells also added to this. While the state bought extra power, farmers bought extra diesel to extract groundwater. Thus, the input cost of cultivation went up leading to farm distress and ...

The Indian Express

Wheat sowing in Punjab was impacted because of the demonetisation of old currency with growers claiming they were unable to buy seeds and other inputs due to “cash crunch”. Punjab agriculture department has also acknowledged that the wheat sowing trailed by five percent because of scrapping of old denomination notes. Problems for farmers also compounded as they were unable to get finance from cooperative banks in the wake of non-acceptance of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 denomination notes by these banks.

Live Mint

Finance minister Arun Jaitley on Saturday called for focus on higher agriculture productivity through use of the latest technology and high-yielding crop varieties to help double farmers’ income by 2022. He also said there is a need to revisit the incentive structure of farming, besides focusing on reducing wastage and improving marketing of farm produce. Jaitley was speaking at his first pre-budget consultative meeting with representatives of agriculture groups.

The Hindu

Several agricultural groups requested Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, during their pre-Budget consultative meeting on Saturday, to provide sufficient funds to district co-operative banks in the light of demonetisation since most farmers had their accounts in such banks. The agricultural representatives also called for new schemes in the upcoming Budget to bail out farmers from debt and a system where banks offer differential rates of interest for the agricultural sector, according to an official release.