Dear Moa,
Thank you for the comment. My article is from the perspective of consumer in the marketplace focusing on degrowth. The aim was to highlight the sustainable practices. I have mentioned in the article that corruption is a major concern and farmers are exploited as they face huge challenge to get the right price for their produce. I agree with you that Indian farmers are one of the poorest and exploited community. However, central point of the article was sustainable practices of Indian market place compared to USA.

Dear Moa,
My article is from the perspective of consumer in the marketplace focusing on degrowth. The aim was to highlight the sustainable practices. I have mentioned in the article that corruption is a major concern and farmers are exploited as they face huge challenge to get the right price for their produce. I agree with you that Indian farmers are one of the poorest and exploited community. However, central point of the article was sustainable practices of Indian market place compared to USA.

And the statement “India’s local market model is extremely efficient” without even slightly considering the reality of the Indian traditional local market is hilarious. As if a farmer dwelling on the farm is not hard enough, yet having to face the hardship of coming to the marketplace and spending his/her own money on transportation to sell a few vegetables in the hot weather should not be deemed as extremely efficient just because it functions somehow.

India’s single and marginalized farmers represent 80% of the overall farmers, with income lower than most of the industry. Despite Millions of farmers engaged in fruits and vegetable production and being the 2nd largest producer of fruits and vegetables in the world, a massive 30-40% of the total fruits and veg produce gets wasted annually before it reaches the consumers. That’s a gigantic loss of over 40,000 Cr or $5 Billion USD, impacting poor farmers the most.

Our Indian traditional farming practice is becoming unsustainable for farmers, coupled with that the age-old Agri supply chain which is highly inefficient. For example, for every Kg of tomato being sold in the market @ Rs 55, farmers are getting paid only Rs 9 to 12 per Kg. So, the question is where the hell is 40 bucks going? Well, it gets eaten up by the layers of supply chain actors (intermediaries/middlemen) who gulp up over 75% of the total accrued supply chain margin, while not needed or adding hardly any value. The consequence of it is that the farmers get little profit and the consumers ended up paying artificially inflated prices.

What we need is speedy modernization in farming to feed the growing 1.5 billion population. That includes technological inputs into farming, data-driven supply chain, cold storage, vertically integrated facilities, etc because the traditional farming practice is no more efficient and sustainable for farmers and the country. I understand what the western country doing to its products may not be most desirable and may seem too capitalistic but our traditional farming and distribution, on the other hand, is aged and isn’t helping the most important people anymore i.e – the farmers and the consumers.

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Hello Rich,
It is the race between greed and humanity. I think market or money has more to do with capitalism than ecology. The system has become crony capitalist and inequality gap has increased across the globe. The ideas of nature (ecology), survival and humanity has been completely been missing from capitalist market/society. Responsible behavior comes when market and community becomes environment centric and moves away from consumerism. Instead of being profit oriented market needs to be value oriented.

Hi Rick!
Sorry for replying so late. Well I do not have any expertise on sustainable farming in India but I am well aware that there is big issue of irrigation in Indian agriculture. Many farmers are still focus on water intensive crops but at the same time there are farmers who are moving away from it. Also, an average farmer in India is poor so affordability wins over sustainable agriculture and affordable agriculture is not same as sustainable agriculture. If you want to know more about sustainable agriculture you can look at the works of AKRSP(I) and ASA, they are NGOs working in rural development and agriculture.