Professor Philip Alston, the current United Nations Special Rapporteur on poverty and human rights, has recently reported on conditions of extreme poverty and denial of human rights in the United Kingdom (Alston 2018). The report highlights such conditions with special reference to the effects of ongoing austerity measures.
Are Rural Households Really Saving? NABARD National Financial Inclusion Survey – 2
In the last year, there have been several peasant protests in different parts of the country, a reflection of low incomes and distress among the peasantry. We now have a new source of data on the extent of savings and investment of rural households. According to NAFIS, on average, a rural household had a monthly income of Rs 8,059 in the survey year (the figure was Rs 8,931 for an agricultural household). The main point of this Note is to argue that this picture is flawed — it is very unlikely that rural households in distress, particularly those in the lower income deciles, have positive savings.
NABARD National Financial Inclusion Survey (NAFIS) – 1
A major new source of data on rural households is the recently completed NABARD-sponsored National Financial Inclusion Survey or NAFIS 2016-17. This is a large sample survey covering 40,327 households in 245 districts of 29 States. Except for a pilot survey, the NSSO has never attempted to collect data on income and expenditure whereas NAFIS provides estimates of income, expenditure, saving, investments and asset ownership. In this first Note on NAFIS, I shall focus on income.
Agricultural Tenancy and the Recommendations of the Dalwai Committee
Land reform is an essential condition for removing the burden of absolute ground rent and set free the forces of production in agriculture in a rural society of a developing economy. Agricultural tenancy reform is an important component of land reform, where the state ensures security of tenure and maintains regulation of rent in particular in order to protect rights to cultivation of tenant farmers.
Congratulations to R. Ramakumar
The Foundation for Agrarian Studies (FAS) congratulates R. Ramakumar, Professor, School of Development Studies, Tata Institute of Social Sciences, Mumbai, for being awarded the Bernstein & Byres Prize in Agrarian Change for 2017, for his article ‘Jats, Khaps and Riots: Communal Politics and the Bharatiya Kisan Union in Northern India’.
Kudumbashree’s Success as a Multi-stakeholder Partnership to Improve Food Security and Nutrition: Report by High Level International Committee
Kudumbashree, Kerala’s flagship programme for women’s livelihood security, has been in existence now for over two decades. Its contributions to food security and nutrition has recently been highlighted by the High Level Panel of Experts of the Committee on World Food Security in its new report titled “Multi-stakeholder partnerships to finance and improve food security and nutrition in the framework of the 2030 Agenda.”
Documenting the Kisan Long March
On March 6, 2018, a farmers’ protest march under the banner of the All Indian Kisan Sabha (AIKS) began from CBS Chowk in Nashik. The swelling sea of marching peasants and workers, wearing red caps and carrying red flags and banners, ended their 200 km march at the historic Azad Maidan in Mumbai in the early hours of March 12, 2018. The six-day march or the Long March, as the march came to be called, was watched on television screens across the country with growing admiration and support.
Minimum Support Price for Kharif Crops, 2018-19
The Union Government announced minimum support prices (MSP) for 17 agricultural commodities (14 kharif crops) on July 4, 2018. The announcement came in the backdrop of the assurance provided by the Prime Minister to sugarcane farmers that the Government is going to provide MSP for kharif crops at one and half times of production cost. However, a closer look at the MSP reveals that for no crop was MSP more than 50 per cent of production cost.
Sources of Energy and “Time-Poverty” Among Rural Women
It is well known that women play an integral role in the procurement as well as use of cooking energy, particularly from biomass. Existing gender roles within households impose a differential burden on men and women, with women having to bear most of the adverse effects of time-consuming and unsafe sources of energy for cooking and lighting.
Women’s Education in Odisha: A District Profile
Data from the fourth round of the National Family Health Survey 2015-16 (NFHS-4) show that education of girls and women continues to be neglected in rural areas of Odisha. District Fact Sheets from NFHS-4 show that every second female aged 6 and above in rural areas of six districts of south Odisha had not attended school.
