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TThree major elements of

the United Progressive

Alliance government'scommitment to provide food security

to the people are reforming the

public distribution system (PDS),

raising foodgrain productivity and

p r o d u c t i o n , a n d c r e a t i n g a

decentralised, modern warehousing

system.

Ideally, the reforms in the PDS

should have come first for the

availability and delivery of subsidised

foodgrains to become meaningful

and comprehensive. Be that as it may,

the recommendation of the NationalAdvisory Council (NAC) to launch

universal PDS in one-fourth of all

districts or blocks for a start should be

seen as a paradigm shift towards

universalisation. This move reveals

that the all-powerful NAC headed by

UPA chairperson Sonia Gandhi has

realised that the ability to deliver

cheap foodgrains will be contingent

on availability availability that is

home-grown, not based on imports.

In order to make a serious effort tomeet the provisions of the proposed

food security Bill, it is essential to

enhance the production of wheat,

rice, pulses, oilseeds and millets.

This, in turn, needs a policy review in

favour of land reforms, securing

fertile agricultural land for foodgrain

production rather than allowing the

indiscriminate setting up of special

economic zones (SEZs), mega-food

parks and builders' colonies on

farmers' fields.

By all indications, the 150 districts

from where universal PDS would

commence will be in the ruralpoverty-belt in Jharkhand, Bihar,

Chhattisgarh, Orissa, Assam, eastern

Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and

Rajasthan. Recent events have

shown that there is a certain urgency

about reaching out to the poor and

the marginalised people in this belt.

The rough calculation is that

universalisation will begin in some

1,500 blocks (an average of 10 in each

of the 150 districts) where more than

95 per cent of the population is poor.

The criterion that is being worked outwill exclude those who are in salaried

or government jobs, are income tax

payees, have a four-wheeler or own a

plot or a house with a plinth area of

over 500 square feet. Using these

criteria, it is estimated that about five

per cent of the population would be

out of the scheme in these districts.

This will be crucial because the

identification of beneficiaries and

implementation of the scheme will

be done by the State governments.It has also been decided to

subsume the “poorest of the poor”

the Antyodaya Anna Yojna bene-

ficiary families now numbering 2.5

crore of the 6.5 crore Below Poverty

Line (BPL) families. The AAY

beneficiaries buy PDS foodgrains at

Rs.2 a kg. They will have to pay Re.1

more for grain under the universal

PDS, which will provide 35 kg wheat

or rice at Rs.3 a kg per family to all the

identified beneficiaries, including

those in the Above Poverty Line (APL)

category, in the identified districts.

For the rest of the 490-odddistricts where targeted PDS will

continue for now, the Tendulkar

Committee's poverty estimate of

8.07 core families will hold. Hence,

for the APL population that is brought

in or kept out of the PDS depending

on grain availability, it will be status

quo for the time being. The APL

families will gradually (possibly over

five years) be assured of a minimum

of 25 kg per family at prices that will

be worked out by the govern-ment.

The subsidy burden will depend onthe estimated offtake and the cost

will be worked out by the Union

Ministry of Food and Public

Distribution.

Welfare measures including mid-

d a y m e a l p r o g r a m m e s , t h e

integrated child development

schem e and ca lam ity re l ie f

programmes will continue. The

inclusion of the destitute, migrants,

the old, the infirm and the urban poor

will be worked out after the HashimCommittee report on urban poverty

is received. For now, pulses and

edible oils will not be included in the

food basket under the proposed

National Food Security Act as the

acute shortfall in the production of

these commodities is met by large-

scale imports.

Broadly, there wi l l be an

enhanced outgo of about 20 million

tonnes on account of providing 35 kg

(up from the present 12 kg) to the APL

• By : Dr. Divya

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population at Rs.3 a kg in the 150

districts in addition to the BPL outgo.

In a bad year, this may come from

cutting APL or Open Market Sale

Scheme allocations.It is clear by now that the key to

universalisation is the availability of

foodgrains. For this reason, even the

activists working under the banner of

the Right to Food Campaign have

accepted “phased” universalisation.

The Food Ministry's cautious

estimate is that the average annual

availability for the PDS is about 43

million tonnes. The NAC seems to

have gone by the P lanning

Commission estimate of availability

of about 50 to 55 million tonnes to

ensure the supply of cheap

foodgrains in 150 districts besides

fulfilling regular commitments of

buffer and welfare schemes.

It is obvious that the UPA's

seeming benevolence on the food

security front is not going to be

entirely without strings. The

underlying principle is that the

subsidy accruing from providing

foodgrains at cheap rates will come

from withdrawal of subsidies onpetrol, diesel and, gradually,

kerosene, and other unforeseen

measures.

Besides ensuring minimum

foodgrain entitlements at a discount,

the draft of the National Food

Security Act will indicate enabling

clauses with regard to enhancing

foodgrain production, public distri-

bution reforms and improvement in

drinking water, sanitation, health and

hygiene for better intake and

absorption of food by the poor.

In other words, the proposed Bill

will provide for food security but call

for nutrition security.

Salient features of the Food Security

Bill are as follows:

President Pratibha Patil on June 4,

2009 said that a National Food

Security Act would be formulated

whereby each BPL family would be

entitled by law to get 25 kg of rice or

wheat per month at Rs 3 a kg, a

promise made by the Congress

before general elections 2009.

The draft Food Security Bill would

provide 25 kg of wheat/ rice to BPL

households at Rs. 3/- per kg. Forsome, it is just old wine in a new

bottle and would rely excessively on

existing infrastructure and logistical

support of the public distribution

system (PDS).

If made into a law, the draft Food

Security Bill would reduce the

allocation for a below poverty line

(BPL) household (e.g. in the case of

Antodaya Anna Yojana) from 35 kg of

rice/ wheat per month to 25 kg of

rice/ wheat per month. This would

appear contradictory to many who

expected the Bill to be a benign effort

of the UPA-II (2009-****) to ensure

food security. There are possibilities

of inc reased food subs id ies

amounting to Rs. 70,000 crore per

annum if the Bill becomes a law,

which might be opposed by those

who prefer to follow neo-liberal

doctrine. Subsidies are usually

opposed on the pretext of distortion

in prices, inefficiency and leakages.

The Interim Budget 2009-10 estimateof the food subsidy bill in 2009-10

was Rs. 42,490 crore.

The exact number of BPL

households may vary according to

the definition of poverty line one

selects. In that case, it would be

difficult to target the original BPL

households under the new Food

Security law. There are four different

estimates for the number of BPL

households: one by Prof. Arjun

Sengupta, another by Dr. NC Saxena,

World Bank estimates and the

Planning Commission estimates.

According to Prof. Arjun Sengupta

w h o c h a i r e d t h e N a t i o n a l

Commission for Enterprises in the

Unorganized Sector, 77% of the

population of India lives below the

poverty line. Dr. NC Saxena, a retired

c i v i l s e r v a n t a c t i n g a s a

Commissioner appointed by the

Supreme Court, feels that half the

country's population of 1.15 billion is

below the poverty line, which he

apparently defines as a monthly per

capita income of Rs 700 in rural areas

and Rs 1,000 in urban areas. While a

Planning Commission estimate putsthe number of below poverty line

(BPL) families at 62.5 million, state

governments estimate that this

number is closer to 107 million. Some

experts feel that availing the public

with more number of BPL ration

cards help the state-level politicians

to win elections through populist

means. The World Bank's figure for

the percentage of population below

the poverty line in India is 42 per cent,

based on 2005 data.

The Uniform Recall Period (URP)

Consumption distribution data of

National Sample Survey (NSS) 61st

Round places the poverty ratio at

28.3 per cent in rural areas, 25.7 per

cent in urban areas and 27.5 per cent

for the country as a whole in 2004-05.

The corresponding poverty ratios

from the Mixed Recall Period (MRP)

consumption distribution data are

21.8 per cent for rural areas, 21.7 per

cent for urban areas and 21.8 per

cent for India as a whole. While the

former consumption data uses 30-

day recall/reference period for all

items of consumption, the latter uses

365-day recall/reference period for

five infrequently purchased non-food

Copyright © 2010 | WWW.UPSCPORTAL.COM Vol. - 17

Article







items, namely, clothing, footwear,

durable goods, education and

institutional medical expenses and

30-day recall/reference period for

remaining items. The percentage of poor in 2004-05 estimated from URP

consumption distribution of NSS 61st

Round of consumer expenditure data

are comparable with the poverty

estimates of 1993-94 (50th Round)

which was 36 per cent for the country

as a whole. The percentage of poor in

2004-05 estimated from MRP

consumption distribution of NSS 61st

Round of consumer expenditure data

may not fall below the poverty line

but are already exposed to food

insecurity? The Rome Declaration

(1996) made during the World Food

Summit states that 'food security isachieved when all people, at all

times, have physical and economic

access to sufficient, safe and

nutritious food to meet their dietary

needs and food preferences for an

active life'. Food security is about

nutrition security too. If that is the

case, the Food Security Bill has to

rethink about the quality of

foodgrains supplied and distributed.

The Food Security Bill must also aim

at providing fortified foodgrains

along with edible oils, salt and

essential spices. A balanced diet

would ensure both food and nutrition

security. The basket of commodities,

which would be available to the

consumers, should reflect local tastes

and preferences and must include

locally grown cereals and legumes.

The alternative draft Food

Security Bill that has been prepared

by Prof. Jean Dreze and his team and

which has been scrutinized by 10,

Janpath, according to mediaresources, has clauses to make the

various food related programmes

running in the country more

accountable and transparent. There

is focus on public accountability and

more coverage of BPL households

under the yet to be enacted Food

Security law. Prof. Dreze's draft points

out that subsidy would not rise due to

reduction in allocation for rice/

wheat per BPL household.

If targeting of BPL households is

done under the Food Security Bill,

then it might lead to inclusion

(including the non-poor) and

exclusion (excluding the poor) errors.

It would be wiser to go for

universalization (rather than

targeting) as was recommended by

the Committee on Long Term Grain

Policy under the chairmanship of

Prof. Abhijit Sen (2000-02).

There are apprehensions that

sustainability of Food Security law

would be at peril if India faces lower

agricultural production due to poor

harvest, drought etc. in the future. Is

India ready to rely upon food imports

and food aid to ensure right to food?At present, the country has been

facing shortage in south-west

monsoon rainfall that might affect

agricultural production and prices of

commodities. Is India ready to rely

exclusively upon biotechnology for

increasing its agricultural production

so as to ensure food security for all?

Some analysts feel that India

presently has adequate buffer stocks

to enact and implement the Food

Security law.

The Food Security law is nothing

but a gimmick so as to increase the

popularity of the UPA II. This is a

forward-looking step to ensure vote

for the Congress so that Rahul Gandhi

could lead UPA-III.

Seeing the popularity of the

N a t i o n a l R u r a l E m p l o y m e n t

Guarantee Scheme (NREGS), which

helped the Congress to win the 2009

parliamentary elections, the newly

constituted Government has thought

of bringing out the Food Security Actwithin the first 100 days of its stay in

the office for the second time.

The World Development Report

2008-Agriculture for Development,

which has been brought out by the

World Bank mentions that India

presently faces the problem of

depleting ground water level that

makes agriculture unsustainable and

poses risk to environment. If rice is

one of the foodgrain that would be

supplied when the Food Security Act

comes into being, then more and

more farmers would go for

cultivation of rice. In the Punjab

r e g i o n , o v e r e x p l o i t a t i o n o f

groundwater takes place thanks to

the huge subsidies given on

electricity. Moreover, minimum

support prices (MSP) for rice increase

the financial attractiveness of rice

relative to less water-intensive crops,

which makes depletion of ground

water table more obvious.

are roughly comparable with the

poverty estimates of 1999-2000

(55th Round) which was 26.1 per cent

for the country as a whole Instead of

better implementation of the already

existing schemes such as the

Targeted Public Distribution System

(TPDS), Antodaya Anna Yojana (AAY),Integrated Child Development

Scheme (ICDS), Mid Day Meal

Scheme (MDMS) etc., the Food

Security law might make things

unduly worse and unnecessarily

complicated. A cynical question here

would be: Is the Food Security Bill

going to replace all such food related

schemes that existed before its

enactment?

If the Bill is about ensuring food

security, how can it leave those who

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