by Emeritus Professor Ranjith Senaratne

Department of Crop Science, University of Ruhuna (ransen.ru@gmail.com)

(Continued from 03 March, 2025)

Voiceless farmers and toothless farmer organisations

The hapless farmers, who render a yeoman service to the nation by ensuring food and nutritional security are often at the mercy of some large-scale rice traders and millers. They get a raw deal at the end of the day, and this vicious cycle has gone on for many years with no end in sight. Consequently, every year, several “nation’s feeders” take their own lives out of sheer frustration and hopelessness. There are farmers’ organisations in the country who speak on behalf of the hapless farmer, but their protests seldom make an impact on the politicians and policy makers to change the status quo. What is most ironic is that the millions of paddy farmers who feed the nation are voiceless and powerless, while even private bus drivers, three-wheeler drivers and railway guards, to name a few, are much more powerful and make themselves heard.

However, many countries have powerful farmer organisations that wield much influence at the national level. Hence, it is possible and important to strengthen and give muscle to local farmer organisations through awareness, professional training and capacity building so that they could evolve into a vibrant and powerful force that cannot be brushed aside, but must be reckoned with by the policy makers, planners and politicians. Opportunistic political elements with ulterior motives masquerading as farmer representatives should not be allowed to exploit these hapless “nation feeders” for their narrow political ends, something which is unfortunately evident in our country. The Faculties of Agriculture and professional bodies in allied fields have a responsibility and moral obligation to provide leadership and guidance to bona fide farmer organisations which will contribute not only to improving the socio-economic standard of the millions of farmers and their families, but also to enhancing food and nutritional security in the country.

Uncoordinated and unregulated crop production

There is a plethora of government institutions in the agricultural sector, yet no institution is mandated to coordinate and regulate the national crop production. Taking into account land capability, climatic potential, food demand, export potential etc. will minimise food surpluses and scarcities and overuse of fertilisers and pesticides while ensuring a fair price to both the farmer and consumer. Presently, anybody with land and the necessary resources and inputs can cultivate any crop anywhere on any scale at any time. However, in many countries, food production and food imports are carefully regulated to minimise food surplus and scarcity. Farmers are given incentives to produce less when a glut is anticipated and to produce more when a scarcity is likely. Such decisions are based on market surveys, meteorological forecasts and past experience, ensuring fairly stable prices throughout the year.

In each district, govt. support such as fertiliser subsidies, crop insurance, provision of water, bank loans, etc., should be provided only to farmers with a proven track record who cultivate paddy in productive areas adhering to the recommended cultural practices. If a field with high potential produces a low yield, it is likely to be associated with poor management. Cultivation of such paddy fields should be given to promising farmers in the area and benefits should be shared between the two parties in an equitable manner. This will help realise the potential yield from the field. Such intervention could be made with the support of the farmer organisations in the area.

Lack of robust anti-hoarding laws

Hoarding of agricultural produce and the consequences arising therefrom have posed formidable challenges to governments and caused untold hardships to the consumers in many parts of the world. As regard paddy production in Sri Lanka, it is reported that nearly 70% is purchased by the small and medium scale millers and the remaining 30% by a few large scale millers. While the veracity of those figures is yet to be established, the existing laws and regulations are not robust enough to effectively deal with the issues of hoarding and associated problems which have precipitated a prolonged crisis in the country. In this context, it is appropriate to see how the Philippines has dealt with a similar problem. The new law, Anti-Agricultural Economic Sabotage Act, enacted by the Dept. of Agriculture in the Philippines in September, 2024 has declared smuggling and hoarding of agricultural products as economic sabotage and has imposed stiff penalties against smugglers and hoarders of agricultural food products, including heavy fines, i.e. 5 times the value of smuggled and hoarded agricultural products and life imprisonment if found guilty. Such deterrent punishment would benefit the farmers and fisher folk whose livelihoods have been jeopardized by unscrupulous traders and smugglers (https://www.da.gov.ph/da-chief-new-law-declares-smuggling-hoarding-of-agricultural-products-as-economic-sabotage/). The Government in our country could introduce such laws to deal with undisclosed hoarding of agricultural produce and products by traders and millers. Through constructive engagement with traders and millers and deployment of electronic sensor based computational intelligence in storage bins or silos, the govt. will be able to ascertain the stock position on a real-time basis so that necessary interventions could be made to minimize shortages and price fluctuations in rice. This technology has many applications in smart inventory and stock management and such technological interventions can be facilitated by the newly established Ministry of Digital Technology.

In order to avoid making this article lengthy, I have not elaborated on some further factors contributing to the rice crisis. However, they have been dealt with in the book edited by the writer in 2021 titled “The Future of the Agriculture and the Agriculture of the Future: From Beaten Track to Untrodden Paths”.

Conclusions

Availability of rice and its price depend on the rice value chain which encompasses not only a multitude of actors and players, but also several sectors of the economy. Therefore, there are no simple, straight forward solutions to such a complex, multi-faceted and multi-dimensional problem, and tinkering with the system is to no avail and will only aggravate matters. This problem, developed over many years, demands a holistic systems approach through transsdisciplinary interventions. Here, the issue should be viewed in an integrated manner as a collection of interconnected and interdependent elements and people, taking into account the relationships and interactions between them. This calls for a paradigm shift and bold, proactive and pragmatic moves in order to bring about a sustainable solution to this complex, intractable and drawn-out problem, thereby ensuring year-round availability of rice at an affordable price to the ordinary citizen.

This would, among other things, include enactment of the requisite laws and regulations to deal with the oligopoly of rice trade and the lack of price regulation of key imported agricultural inputs such as pesticides, weedicides, fungicides etc. and services such as hiring of machinery for land preparation, harvesting, threshing etc. for which the farmers presently pay exorbitant prices. In addition, announcing the guaranteed price of paddy only after the harvest is an unkind cut. The price should be made known to the prospective farmers well ahead of the beginning of the cultivation season, thereby giving them an opportunity and the space to decide whether to cultivate paddy on a commercial scale and, if so, to what extent.

Needless to add that the hapless farmers are at the mercy of the large-scale rice millers and traders, including input and service providers. However, we must recognize the pivotal and crucial role they play in supporting the paddy production and providing quality rice to the consumer. However, the failures of the governments to date to enact and enforce the requisite laws and regulations have made the farmers extremely vulnerable and prone to exploitation in a fiercely competitive globalized environment where ethical and moral values are fast eroding.

Therefore what is needed in this decisive hour in not to continue finding fault with and flogging the large-scale millers and traders, or blaming the previous regimes, but to make proactive and constructive moves, hasten to enact pragmatic and actionable laws and regulations, and beef up the relevant law enforcement and regulatory authorities such as Consumer Affairs Authority, providing them with the much needed teeth and resources to address the said key issues as a matter of top priority and the utmost urgency. The government has received an overwhelming mandate with 159 members in the parliament. Hence, the above interventions will be only a walk in the park for the government to introduce. The earlier it happens, the better, since the next rice crisis, like the second wave of the tsunami in 2004, could be much worse and more disastrous not only in economic and social, but also in political terms.

(The writer appreciates the comments and observations made by Dr. W.M.W. Weerakoon, former Director General, Dept. of Agriculture, Dr. Sumith Abeysiriwardena, former Director, Rice Research and Development Institute, Bathalagoda and Mr. C.S. Kumarasinghe, Senior Lecturer, Department of Crop Science, University of Ruhuna on a draft of this article)