08-17-2009, 10:47 AM
<b>Time for action, not words</b>
Arun Nehru<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->The political honeymoon is over for the UPA Government. The poor monsoon and its effect on the economy will take some time to be fully understood. The Governmentâs skill in managing this crisis is crucial. We will no doubt have a fair amount of doom and gloom situation as everyone with a negative bias towards the Government will tend to exaggerate the crisis. According to current indications, o<b>ur GDP growth rate may drop from 6.5 per cent to six per cent, while agriculture output may go down by five per cent and trigger shortages that could be artificially aggravated</b>. In such a scenario price rise is inevitable. <b>On the supply side, marginal farmers will be worst hit. Increased Government expenditure in the drought-ravaged areas is inevitable and this will certainly be a strain on our resources</b>.
The Government should take a positive approach to deal with the situation. We have had two super harvests before this and the Government, at least in theory, has a large stockpile of food grains. Therefore, we should have no shortages of either rice or wheat, while shortages in edible oil and any other food product can be mitigated through imports. It is unfortunate that when a crisis is upon us, then we start thinking of possible solutions. But good governance demands that we be prepared for such crises beforehand. The Government and we as responsible citizens can start acting in a meaningful manner by harvesting water, storing and recycling wherever possible and by initiating cost effective measures such as avoiding wastage of water and electricity in industry and our homes.
There is always the possibility of the monsoon picking up in late August and September but media reports indicate that the predictions on the El Nino effect from the US Climate Center are not very good. <b>I wonder why we cannot have an accurate forward projection on this from our Met Department. The media reporting has been very patchy and this is primarily because the data it is given is rather vague.</b>
We are generally good in dealing with crisis situations as we have faced many before. But there is a difference between dealing with a situation with an action plan already in hand and reacting in panic. We have dealt with droughts before. It is time we develop a proper response system to them.
On the other hand, <b>the Government must take ruthless measures against black-marketers and hoarders and use every law in the book to punish them. We can already see an upward trend in the prices of essential commodities as the demand and supply ratio is being negatively affected by news of a weak monsoon. </b>The Government will have to display a great deal of deft in releasing buffer stocks of wheat and rice to prevent their prices from increasing. The Union Minister for Food and Agriculture, Mr Sharad Pawar, will have much to do. Hopefully, cricket is not going to be a priority for him in 2009. Politics for the next couple of months will take a backseat and we must wish the Governments both at the Centre and in the States well as they tackle the drought situation.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
Arun Nehru<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->The political honeymoon is over for the UPA Government. The poor monsoon and its effect on the economy will take some time to be fully understood. The Governmentâs skill in managing this crisis is crucial. We will no doubt have a fair amount of doom and gloom situation as everyone with a negative bias towards the Government will tend to exaggerate the crisis. According to current indications, o<b>ur GDP growth rate may drop from 6.5 per cent to six per cent, while agriculture output may go down by five per cent and trigger shortages that could be artificially aggravated</b>. In such a scenario price rise is inevitable. <b>On the supply side, marginal farmers will be worst hit. Increased Government expenditure in the drought-ravaged areas is inevitable and this will certainly be a strain on our resources</b>.
The Government should take a positive approach to deal with the situation. We have had two super harvests before this and the Government, at least in theory, has a large stockpile of food grains. Therefore, we should have no shortages of either rice or wheat, while shortages in edible oil and any other food product can be mitigated through imports. It is unfortunate that when a crisis is upon us, then we start thinking of possible solutions. But good governance demands that we be prepared for such crises beforehand. The Government and we as responsible citizens can start acting in a meaningful manner by harvesting water, storing and recycling wherever possible and by initiating cost effective measures such as avoiding wastage of water and electricity in industry and our homes.
There is always the possibility of the monsoon picking up in late August and September but media reports indicate that the predictions on the El Nino effect from the US Climate Center are not very good. <b>I wonder why we cannot have an accurate forward projection on this from our Met Department. The media reporting has been very patchy and this is primarily because the data it is given is rather vague.</b>
We are generally good in dealing with crisis situations as we have faced many before. But there is a difference between dealing with a situation with an action plan already in hand and reacting in panic. We have dealt with droughts before. It is time we develop a proper response system to them.
On the other hand, <b>the Government must take ruthless measures against black-marketers and hoarders and use every law in the book to punish them. We can already see an upward trend in the prices of essential commodities as the demand and supply ratio is being negatively affected by news of a weak monsoon. </b>The Government will have to display a great deal of deft in releasing buffer stocks of wheat and rice to prevent their prices from increasing. The Union Minister for Food and Agriculture, Mr Sharad Pawar, will have much to do. Hopefully, cricket is not going to be a priority for him in 2009. Politics for the next couple of months will take a backseat and we must wish the Governments both at the Centre and in the States well as they tackle the drought situation.<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->