The Indian government is prioritizing the welfare of the country’s farmers and started several farmer-benefitting schemes.

Central government schemes for farmers aim to fulfill the aspirations of the country’s farmers.

These schemes help modernize the country’s agriculture sector, improve crop quantity and quality, and enhance farmers’ economic conditions.

These schemes include Soil health card, National Agriculture Market (e-NAM), Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana (PMKSY), Neem coated urea, PM Kisan Samman Nidhi Yojana, Kisan Credit Card (KCC), etc.

All these schemes started by the government apply to all farmers in the country to benefit them and strengthen their economic condition.

Government Schemes for Farmers in India

Several schemes launched by the Government of India for agriculture aim to revolutionize the agriculture sector, improve farmers’ income, and contribute to the country’s economic development. These schemes are:

Soil Health Card Scheme

The soil health card is a central Government of India’s scheme promoted by the Department of Agriculture and Cooperation under the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmer Welfare.

Implementing this scheme is the responsibility of the Department of Agriculture of all State and Union Territory.

This scheme was launched in 2015 to assist the State Governments in providing farmers with a soil health card.

This card helps determine soil health; it contains indicators measuring soil health, which can be evaluated without the help of technical equipment or laboratories.

Soil health cards provide information to farmers on soil health and advice on suitable doses of nutrients to improve soil health and fertility. 

Objectives of the Scheme

• The government plans to cover all farmers in the country under this scheme
• All parts of the country are covered under this scheme
• Soil card contains information on the soil, and farmers will get a report about the soil of their farm field.

National Agricultural Market (e-NAM)

The National Agricultural Market or eNAM, is one of the central government schemes for farmers, it is an online agricultural commodities trading platform. eNAM facilitates online commodity trading for farmers, traders, and buyers.

Launched in April 2014 by the ministry of agriculture, eNAM is funded by the central government, and the small farmer agribusiness Consortium (SFAC) is implementing this farmers’ scheme in India. 

100 Agricultural Produce Market Committees (APMCs) are linked with eNAM having 50 lakh members in 18 states and 2 union territories.

Exporters and traders benefit from this marketplace by getting a large quantity and quality products from one place and providing transparent financial transactions. The scheme also has other advantages:

• Improved market accessibility with transparent online trading.
• Real-time price discovery and stable price realization for farmers.
• Information on the eNAM mobile app about the prices of goods.
• Information is received via SMS about the quantity and price of sold goods
• Payments are directly into the farmers’ bank account.

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Objectives of the eNAM Scheme

• First, integrate markets at the state level and, in due course, throughout the country via the online market portal to facilitate Pan-India trade in agricultural products.
• Streamline trading procedures and standardize them across all markets to promote efficient functioning.
• To promote better marketing opportunities for farmers/sellers through online access to more buyers/markets.
• Provide similar information between farmers and traders, real-time price discovery of agricultural products based on actual supply and demand.
• Auction process transparency, product quality improvement, online payment, etc. Establish quality assessment systems for quality assurance to encourage informed customer bids.
• Promote stable prices and availability of quality products to consumers.

Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana (PMKSY)

PMKSY scheme was introduced in July 2015 to provide irrigation facilities to every farm in India, Har Khet ko Paani. This scheme aims to increase cultivable areas, minimize water wastage, and enhance water use efficiency. 

This scheme focuses on creating resources for guaranteed irrigation, creating sheltered by harvesting rainwater through “Jal Sanchay” and “Jal Sinchan. Micro-irrigation is also promoted via subsidies to ensure a higher yield per drop.

The goal in the framework of micro-irrigation for 2016-2017 was 8 thousand hectares; in contrast, 8.39 lakh hectares have been covered.

Objectives of the PMKSY Scheme

• Ensure irrigation coverage at the field level (creating water use plans at the district level and, if necessary, at the state level).
• Improve physical access to farm water and increase cultivable land through guaranteed irrigation.
• Integration, distribution, and efficient use of water resources to use water better via appropriate technologies and practices.
• Enhance the efficiency of on-farm water usage to minimize wastage and increase availability in terms of duration and flow.
• To improve precision irrigation and other water-saving technologies
• Increase groundwater recharge and promote sustainable water conservation methods.
• Promote integrated rainfed areas development using a watershed approach for soil and water conservation, groundwater recharge, and runoff retention.
• Promoting water harvesting, water management, and crop cultivation activities for local farmers and field workers.

Neem Coated Urea (NCU)

Among central government schemes for farmers, NCU is another incentive program to regulate urea use, increase plant nitrogen availability, and reduce fertilizer costs.

Neem-coated urea slows down the release of fertilizer and effectively makes the fertilizer available to plants.

Neem-coated urea shows a favorable report from the field. All urea that is domestically produced or imported is now covered with neem. The expected savings equal 10% of urea consumption, thus reducing cultivation costs and improving soil health.

Coating all agricultural grade urea with 100 percent neem is the central government’s transformational decision. Neem-coated urea helps to improve nutritional efficiency, yields, and soil health and control the diversion of agricultural urea to non-agricultural activities.

Advantages of Neem Coated Urea

• Help improves soil health
• Reduces the cost of chemicals for plant protection.
• Help in lowering the pest and disease attacks.
• NCU helps increase yields of corn, paddy, soybeans, sugarcane, etc.
• Diverting subsidized urea among the farmers for non-agriculture activities was negligible after introducing the NCU-only mandatory production and distribution policy.

PM Kisan Samman Nidhi Yojana

Pradhan Mantri Kisan Samman Nidhi Yojana is a scheme under which the government provides financial support of Rs. 6000 per year for all country farmers. The Government of India launched the plan in February 2019.

The amount of this scheme is directly transferred into the bank account of farmers and is paid in three equal installments of Rs. 2000 every four months. The central government provides all the money to run this scheme. 

The Telangana Government started this scheme first, under the name Rythu Bandhu scheme, where farmers directly received a certain amount of money.

But in February 2019, the central government of India implemented this scheme nationwide under the name PM Kisan Yojana. 

Objectives of PM Kisan Yojana

• Provide financial support to all eligible landowners and their families.
• To integrate the financial needs of farmers in the supply of various inputs to ensure good crop health and yield commensurate with expected agricultural income.
• The program is expected to increase coverage to approximately 145 million farmers.
• Aims to cover about 20 million more farmers to benefit them.
• Aims to provide farmers financial help to produce good quality and more quantity agricultural products.

Kisan Credit Card Scheme (KCC)

The Kisan Credit Card (KCC) scheme was launched in 1998 to provide timely credit to farmers to fulfill their agricultural needs, such as purchasing seeds, fertilizer, pesticides, and other things.

KCC provides credit according to the land of a farmer. The scheme aims to provide money for agricultural needs and protect farmers from moneylenders who charge high-interest rates on the loans they acquire from them.

This scheme provides loans to farmers when required, and the credit’s interest rates are also low if the farmers repay the loan on time.

All banks in India provide KCC loans to farmers, such as SBI, J&K, HDFC, ICICI, AXIS, etc.   

Objectives of KCC

• The scheme aims to provide the required credit for crop cultivation
• Post-harvest costs
• To meet farmer’s consumption needs
• To meet capital needs necessary for maintaining agricultural equipment and other agriculture-related assets.

Conclusion

India’s government prioritizes the agriculture sector as this sector provides a livelihood for millions directly and indirectly and plays a vital role in the country’s economic development. 

Considering the vitality of the agriculture sector, the central government launched many schemes for farmers. These central government schemes for farmers aim to help country farmers.

Whether it be soil health card, neem-coated urea, PM Krishi sinchayee yojana, or any other agriculture-related scheme, these help farmers grow quantity and quality produce.