Editorial 1: A hand to the small Farmers: How India’s G20 presidency can address global hunger
Context:
- There is immense challenge before world leaders before the gathering of G-20 ministerial meeting on agriculture in Hyderabad
- As Over the past few years, there were events of crisis to crisis which has severely hindered global progress on the Sustainable Development Goals as accepted by UN member states in 2015.
Challenge related to global food security and Hunger:
- For the first time in decades, there is a rising number of hungry people even though we produce enough food to feed 10 billion people.
- Today, more than 800 million people go to bed hungry. Many of them, paradoxically, are small-scale farmers who produce one-third of the world’s food.
- Hunger is rural: nearly three-fourths of the world’s poorest and food insecure live in rural areas.
- Rural economies, specifically agriculture, have suffered from chronic under-investment.
Challenges for low- and middle-income countries:
- Today, low- and middle-income countries are increasingly indebted and global inflation and local currency depreciation are making it challenging for them to finance their development and climate action.
- Additionally, donor support for agriculture has stagnated at 4-6 per cent of total official development assistance (ODA) for at least two decades
- Estimates suggest that we need US$300-400 billion annually until 2030 to transform food systems. So, investment needs to grow at least 30 times compare to current investment
Investment in the rural agriculture:
- Investing in rural agriculture makes a lot of sense for both governments and companies.
- As boosting local production, local food chains and local markets lead to the global food security jobs and less conflict.
- It will also lead to lower GHG emissions (agriculture is responsible for up to 21 per cent of total emissions).
- For the private sector, investing in small-scale farmers should be a win-win situation: As it will result into low production costs, high returns on capital
- Along with it, farmer organisations and cooperatives have shown they can achieve economies of scale and crop diversification can defray risk for farms and markets.
- These investments can build long-term resilience and reduce the impact of climate change and other shocks. Every US$1 spent on resilience saves up to US$10 in emergency aid in the future.
- Investing in agriculture is at least 2-3 times more effective in reducing poverty than investment in other sectors
Challenge to small-scale agriculture
- Yet small-scale agriculture faces many challenges. Small-scale producers
- lack access to credit
- Access to markets
- Availability of technology,
- Lack of feasible infrastructure, information and land.
- This is where multilateral development banks and international financial institutions like the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) can make a big difference.
- If we de-risk investments through innovative financial instruments and mechanisms, we can help agriculture become the centre of growth it has the potential to be.
India’s role in securing the global food security
- India’s G-20 presidency assumes critical importance in mobilising resources that will allow us to deliver on the international community’s resolve to ensure that every person has access to affordable, safe, sufficient and nutritious food.
- It can be done by
- increasing digitisation,
- making insurance attractive for farmers and insurers,
- providing access to easy and discounted loans,
- securing land rights and strengthening farmers’ organisations.
- India is also a crucial partner in the mission to end rural poverty and hunger. Leveraging the panchayat system, India has successfully built robust community institutions that have strengthened people’s ability to manage their own development.
- These experiences are an inspiration for countries attempting to become food secure. India has shown thoughtful leadership in advancing South-South and triangular cooperation. This has only deepened with its increasing economic weight.
Way forward
- The G-20 can set us on the course to much-needed structural change, mobilising commitments from governments, global financial institutions, investors and companies to invest in medium-term sustainable rural development and agriculture.
- Therefore, India’s presidency can deliver an operationally feasible roadmap for inclusive, resilient and sustainable food systems.
- This will end hunger for 800 million people, create over 120 million decent rural jobs, boost incomes for the bottom 20 per cent and combat climate change, while also protecting biodiversity.
Editorial 2: Three years after Galwan: Where India-China ties stand
Context:
- The Galwan clash of June 15-16, 2020 marked a watershed in India-China ties which were already tense after the Chinese in April intruded into several places in Eastern Ladakh that are claimed by India
About the Galwan clash
- The People’s Liberation Army had pitched tents and an observation post on India’s side of the LAC in Galwan. On the night of June 15, a disagreement over the continued presence of the PLA in that area led to the bloody clash.
- According to reports at the time, Col B Santosh Babu, commander of 16 Bihar who walked up to ask the Chinese to leave, was manhandled by the PLA troops. This led to an escalation and almost five hours of combat involving about 600 soldiers from both sides.
- An agreement between the two sides forbids the use of firearms. The Chinese used clubs that had nails embedded in them. The Indian side had fibreglass batons. Stones were thrown as well.
- Col Babu died after falling in the ice-cold Galwan river, apparently after being hit. Several other Indian soldiers also died after they fell into the river or were pushed in.
- According to some reports, the Chinese may have lost more men than India. The PLA acknowledged four deaths on its side, almost a year later in March 2021. In February 2022, Klaxon, an Australian website, said at least 38 PLA soldiers had drowned.
Relations thereafter
- Three years on, the military tensions continue. India has more than 50,000 troops in Eastern Ladakh, with deployment at forward posts throughout the year.
- Government commented that “…We want the relations [with China] to be good. But the relations can only be good until there is peace and tranquility in the border area. And when there is an agreement, it should be followed,”
- But communication between the two sides had not broken down, he said. On the morning after the clash, Jaishankar had spoken to China’s then foreign minister Wang Yi.
- MEA said, “we have engaged, the military commanders have engaged, our embassies have engaged, I have engaged with my counterpart, and I continue to do that
Ground situation
- In April, Jaishankar had said “the China situation is very fragile and…very challenging”, and “there will be no normal ties with China if border agreements are breached”.
- On the ground, after 18 rounds of military level talks India and China have disengaged at five so-called “friction points”, a term favoured by the government to describe the unilateral changes made by the Chinese to the LAC in April 2020: Galwan, after the violent clash; north and south banks of Pangong Tso in February 2021; at Patrolling Point (PP) 17 in the Gogra-Hot Springs area in August 2021; and PP15 in September 2022.
- Demilitarised “buffer zones” have been established at these places.
- The Chinese intrusions that remain at Depsang Plain and Demchok are being described by both sides as “legacy issues”, meaning they predated the standoff that began in April 2020.
- However, at Depsang Plain, Indian soldiers had been accessing patrolling points beyond Y nallah or Bottleneck junction until the early months of 2020 when PLA units blocked them. South of Demchok, herdsmen taking sheep to areas within the Indian claim line were stopped by Chinese soldiers in an area called Charding-Nilung Nallah.
Concern over Buffer zone patrolling area after the clash
- In a paper submitted this January at the annual DGPs’ Conference organised by the Intelligence Bureau (IB), Leh Superintendent of Police P D Nitya noted that India had lost access to 26 out of 65 patrolling points in Eastern Ladakh “due to restrictive or no patrolling” by Indian security forces.
- Also, Nitya said, the creation of demilitarised buffer zones where disengagement has taken place, leads to “a shift in the border under [Indian] control”, which “ultimately leads to loss of control over these areas by India”.
- Serving and retired Army officers and China experts in the Indian strategic community agree that buffer zones are a loss of territory for India. New Delhi must convey to Beijing that these zones are not a resolution of the problem, but a step to prevent unintended consequences, they say. There is no clarity about how much land has been converted into buffer zones over the disengagement process.
- China is also creating infrastructure in the region, including two bridges on its side of Pangong lake for easier movement from the north bank to the southern bank, and roads and accommodation. India too has been rapidly developing infrastructure on its side — building
What lies ahead
- Despite the continued engagement at several levels, there is a yawning gap between the ways the two sides see the problem.
- With an attempted midnight raid by the PLA on a forward post in Tawang in Arunachal Pradesh last December adding to the tension as a response to it Indian defence minister said that t all issues at the LAC need to be resolved in accordance with existing bilateral agreements and commitments, and the violation of these agreements has eroded the entire basis of bilateral relations.
- Last week MEA said “If there is any expectation that somehow we will normalize while the border situation is not normal, that’s not a well-founded expectation.”
- Meanwhile, bilateral trade has continued apace, with Indian imports from China far outstripping exports.