Ever wondered how MSP for crops is calculated ?

Below is an attempt to present a simplified view, followed by some pertinent questions (just to have better understanding, not taking sides)&

'Farmers Protests'.
the bitter truth, probably -
(COPIED from a friend's wall)
I am still not clear about the issues involved in the Farmer's agitation. So, I asked a friend of mine, who besides engineering is a farmer from Abohar - Fazilka region of Punjab.

Now, after retirement, he is a full-time farmer.
This is what he told me.
"I have been actively farming for almost two decades now and I have witnessed many things happen at APMC’s.
I have seen classifications of C grade grain miraculously change into B grade grain.

Similarly, I've also witnessed the weighbridge weigh in the empty truck at 39 tons & the full truck at 55 tons and later found that the unloaded truck weighed 43 tons at another weighbridge.
Yes I know, you know what I know. Yet let me tell you more abt what you may already know.

There are over 30,000 registered adtiyas in Punjab.
These 30,000 employ another 300,000 sub-agents or sidekicks or people who wouldn’t have made it into doing anything anyplace were it not for the patronage network of these 30,000. There are only 1500 farming villages in Punjab.

330,000 / 1500 is about 220 people on average per village doing the work of middlemen.
Why is this the case?
It’s a long story but someone needs to begin talking about this at some time.
We had a food shortage and a ship to mouth existence until the 1970s.

Agricultural Acts - twisted facts Vs facts.

1. farmer can not sell his bag of rice in Assam from AP since it is one national market hence the act is not useful is twisting of fact.

Fact is with market yard check posts gone there will be freedom of movement of goods .

With freedom to buy outside market yards and within market yards competition will be more benefitting the farmer with a better price .market yards also improve their performance since there is competition . #FarmersAct2020
#DelhiFarmersProtest

Agricultural laws - apprehensions -truth

2. Apprehension .
The present government market yards will be forced to shut down due to the new act .
Truth
This is not correct . Government market yards have Freeland given by government , corpus from market fee .

Nominated market committee chairmen who till now are milking the market yards for personal benefit now be responsible and responsive to farmers since alternative of selling out side market yard is available . #AgriculturalLaw #DelhiFarmersProtest

#Agriculturallaws - Apprehensions - Truth

3.Apprehension
Ambanis and Adanis will set up private markets . Agricultural commodities will go into corporate hands

Truth
Private capital comes only when there are profits . Market yards do not seem to be very profitable.

Long Thread on Farmers protests & Agri reforms: What is the protest all about? Who gets impacted & how? Why are protests concentrated in Punjab & Haryana? Are these really farmers or traders losing grip on monopoly? Are farmers being misled? Let numbers do the talking. Here we go

A top-down view of Indian production is in order here. What does India’s agriculture produce in a year? I like the below chart for FY 2015. Now to understand the complexity, we’ll have to work with one crop & dig details. Let’s work with Wheat.

In 2020, India is looking at 105 million tons of Wheat produce vs 94 mn tons in 2015. What does the growth look like? See below the YoY growth of wheat in India. A 105 mn tons in 2020 will bust the chart below. Forget nay-sayers,Indian agriculture is doing great production.

Something is working well when production goes up consistently. However,while supply is great, demand is not growing as much. Look at the wheat consumption in India. As you see, the demand is consistently below supply by ~ 10 mn tons. Who needs this extra 10% wheat? Not Indians.

Can we export? Unlikely! This is where it gets complicated. Let’s see the United States Dept of Agriculture report on agriculture.The European Union, China, and India accounted for a little over 50 percent of the world’s wheat production (762 mn tons) in 2018/19.

“In context of media reporting, farmer killings are the most reported type of murder in SA. Research by minority white-rights org. AfriForum found more than 70% of farm murders were reported in the press - compare this to femicide, where less than 20% of murders ever appeared.”

“Farm murders are an extremely controversial topic. Partly because, for an extended period, SAPS stopped providing official data on farm attacks & farmer killings - which opened floodgates for false information, speculation & rumours of a government conspiracy against farmers.”

“There is also ongoing debate as to what does or does not qualify as a ‘farm attack’, who qualifies as a ‘farmer’, and how many ‘farms’ should or shouldn’t be included in such data.”

“But, related to the above, it is also because the victims of such attacks are often white (this should not come as a surprise, given that, even as of late 2917, 72% of privately owned agricultural land in SA was held by white owners)...”

“As a result, farm attacks have increasingly become framed as race crimes, or ‘hate crimes’ against whites.” - pg 171 - 171, ‘Femicide in South Africa’