Dr. Md. Shairul Mashreque and Dr. Amir M. Nasrullah :
Recently, our think tanks have focused on some hard facts about rural economy being tormented by years of negligence and deprivation. A plethora of research reports, reflecting the political economy of a battered rural sector, depicts the deplorable condition of Bengali peasantry quixotically clinging to agriculture and the allied occupations-somewhat projecting the “image of limited good.”
Rural communities, operating with a cluster of values, continue to maintain the institutions that account much for the inability to mobilize the productive forces in general. New avenues for participation in poverty reduction strategies can hardly address the problem of alienation of villagwrs associated with various occupations with agriculture as the main stay from the mainstream of capitalist economy at the centre moulded by the whirlpool of globalization.
Rural-friendly agricultural modernisation policy rather leads to the development of underdevelopment, reinforcing dependency syndrome in the countryside. Moreover, man-made crises along with natural calamities compel the victims of policy disaster to shift into cities.
Rural communities are liable to exploitation. The emerging comprador, interceding between the peasant and public administration, organises and disseminates a system of distribution that mirrors the fabric of capitalistic society. Modern urban centers, metropolitan or non-metropolitan, and even market-towns, function as “epiphenomenon” of dominant interests of the investors and trading communities and exploit the peripheries and hinterland.
Surplus, generated from productions, increases capital accumulation. In fact, rural economy has become “a part of the process of capitalistic concentration” with urban investors putting into agriculture. A large portion of surplus finds its way out of villages.
Added to this phenomenon is the flight of rural capital to the city. A huge stock of capital generated by production in the cropping and non-cropping sectors flows into major urban areas through market manipulation, credit recovery lines pestered with high interest and service charge, financial institutions, absentee landlordism and strategic power centers.
The deteriorating economic situation in the countryside shows up in scarcity of food, and production inputs. Rising competition in global scenario depresses rural economy. The irony is that primary producers of food crops have to purchase food at extremely high prices. Things are going in a reverse direction.
A volley of rural development measures of various development agencies has turned into a folly as the rural poor continue to be downtrodden by the onslaught of exploitation. Increasing marginalization of peasants upsets the policymakers. Spillover benefits of economic growth are scanty. Whatever little the vulnerable get in socially construed mechanism of allocation cannot be treated as legitimate share-something meaningful to add to their economic empowerment.
There is little hope of ending the exploitation of the rural peasants by the tycoons, the lumpen bourgeois and absentee landlords residing in the metropolitan areas, unless there is a strong advocacy for public policy to revamp rural economy for giving benefits to the interest of the peasants.
The stark reality is that some urban conglomerates having rural connections use local administration to maintain their position in economic structure. They have an unholy alliance with rich farmers, manipulating bargaining power in or outside the co-operatives.
A new approach to the development of rural economy is of utmost significance against exploitation. Conventional wisdom in local level planning is no use. We badly need economic de-centralisation to prop up revitalisation of rural economy.
We have so many smart programs operated by public promotional agencies and NGOs alike to “foster the creative energies and innovative drive of rural people.” There is no divergence of opinion about the efficient implementation of such programs so that rural economy flourishes from within to reduce poverty. Policymakers may go for the transformation of rural economy putting the poor first, of course, within a pragmatic policy fold.
Crisis at the micro level has accentuated due to globalisation. The outcome is accentuation of urbanisation of rural economy. This has to be restructured through urban decentralisation-creation of rural town with standard markets to help the primary producers and co-operative’s farmers.
Organisational strength is a must for empowering the poor and integrating them into the distribution profile. The rural poor, including small farmers and the landless, should be mobilised into collective institutions or in “loosely co-coordinated associations to upgrade their income and consumption levels.” There must be a policy to ensure their access to newly created organisational links that are expected to integrate rural economy to public administration. This is to minimise the gap between peasantry and the state.
True, rural economy is static with institutional stereotypes and semi-feudal trappings. Capitalist penetration is of course a recent phenomenon. Bangladesh rural economy is a prototype of Asiatic mode of production in a seemingly hydraulic structure.
Peasant economy is slow pitched, with inherent institutional cussedness. Rural poverty is endemic in a “traditional subsistence oriented economy.” It is in the grip of “vicious circle of poverty.” There is little capital investment for massive production in agriculture and entrepreneurial activities.
Introducing ambitious development schemes like ICT and modern infrastructure development in the prevailing economic environment will be less result oriented unless ground is prepared to re-dynamise rural economy. Promoting small investments focusing on “rural and agricultural sector” is a realistic policy capable of implementation.
No cut and dried policy will do. We ought to think that awakening of the rural population through policy planning needs restructuring of rural economy on a pattern acceptable to the villagers. Hunger and malnutrition are inevitable outcomes of under-utilisation and misappropriation of resources. There is a need for an objective policy analysis and advocacy to delve deeply into environment matters
The looming global disaster is a wake up call to Bangladesh. Our government needs to heed to acute global food shortage warning and think to take precautionary measures to face eventuality. In Bangladesh there has been sharp rise in the prices of sugar edible oil and wheat over a last couple of years. There is every possibility of further price hike if our government does not ponder over policy matter to combat crisis situation.. Things should not slip beyond its control in the case of the manipulation of criminal syndicates. They may frequently refer to global food crisis as a ploy to increase the prices of the essentials.
Food security ought to be tightened. Better think to ensure bumper production of Aman crop extending all help to the farmers. The primary producers deserve fair deal and protection of the state from the manipulation of the intermediaries. Take enough steps to create buffer stocks of food grains in view of the crisis engulfing the world economy.
But buffer stock operations to maintain price stabilization of food items in internal markets and to meet sticky situation of food crisis may be soaked with misappropriation. This corrupt practice is proverbial Food crisis loomed large in 2006. But the ruling politicians and bureaucrats unashamedly claimed there was no such crisis. Tactics of misappropriation that are at bureaucrats’ finger end also benefited the ministers. Food otherwise misappropriated was shown as a consignment on the way to a delivery point. Out of 603852 metric tons of food in buffer stock 201204 metric tons of food was shown as consignment on the way. Stories about sinking a barge with food in the river/sea and missing of truckloads of cereal are common and misleading. In reality food items were misappropriated (Bangladesh observer, 4th April 2006). At the local level of rural development village leaders branded as touts benefited from bureaucratic allocation that turned into misappropriation and bungling. This is evidenced from manifold stories of malpractice in public distribution system as in the case of subsidies in agriculture (fertilizer as a case), distribution of khas (government-owned) land, relief under Food for Works Programmes (FWP) and Money for Works Programmes (MWP), rural rationing and Vulnerable Group Feeding(VGD).So public distribution system should be purged of corruption and malpractice. Only beaten tracts in bureaucratic organization will not do. Think of way out to get rid of corruption and redynamize public bureaucracy and local leadership.
Food crisis has left many a person hungry. Nearly 1 billion people worldwide are affected by severe hunger and poverty. Many farmers rely on small plots of land (about one to two acres) for their food and income. The goal agriculture development is to help these farming families produce more food and increase their income, while preserving the land for future generations.
According to reports ‘from the 1960s to 1980s, the “Green Revolution” in Asia and Latin America-a sweeping effort to transform farming methods and improve staple crops such as maize, wheat, and rice-helped to double food production and saved hundreds of millions of lives.’Many governments and donors subsequently shifted their attention to other concerns, believing that the problem of inadequate food supply in the developing world had been solved. This was not the case in Sub-Saharan Africa, however, where some Green Revolution approaches were tried but failed. Meanwhile, in the intervening years, population growth, rising incomes, dwindling natural resources, and a changing climate have caused food prices to rise and agricultural productivity has once again become strained. Many of those affected are smallholder farmers. Three-quarters of the world’s poorest people get their food and income by farming small plots of land about the size of a football field. Most of them barely get by-struggling with unproductive soil, plant diseases, pests, and drought. Their livestock are frequently weak or sick. Reliable markets for their products and good information about pricing are hard to come by, and government policies rarely serve their interests well.These factors, in turn, put millions of families at risk for poverty and hunger as well as malnutrition-the world’s most serious health problem and the single biggest contributor to child mortality. At the same time, one consequence of the first Green Revolution-excessive fertilizer use leading to water pollution-underscores the importance of sustainability to safeguard both environmental and human health.
Helping farmers improve their yields requires a comprehensive approach that includes the use of seeds that are more resistant to disease, drought, and flooding; information from trusted local sources about more productive farming techniques and technologies; greater access to markets; and government policies that serve the interests of farming families.
Agricultural development must also address gender disparities. In Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, women are vital contributors to farm work, but because they have less access to improved seeds, better techniques and technologies, and markets, yields on their plots are typically 20 to 40 percent lower than on plots farmed by men. Addressing this gap can help households become more productive and reduce malnutrition within poor families.
Policy makers should think to encourage sustainable agricultural practices. In an era of increasingly scarce resources and growing impact of climate change, we encourage farmers to embrace and adopt sustainable practices that help them grow more with less land, water, fertilizer, and other costly inputs while preserving natural resources for future generations. We are committed to communicating our strategy more effectively and sharing what we’ve learned with grantees and other partners, including governments, nongovernmental organizations, traditional and emerging donors, and the private sector. Our resources, while significant, represent only a fraction of what is needed. Collaborating effectively with others maximizes our collective impact in helping farming families.
Recently, our think tanks have focused on some hard facts about rural economy being tormented by years of negligence and deprivation. A plethora of research reports, reflecting the political economy of a battered rural sector, depicts the deplorable condition of Bengali peasantry quixotically clinging to agriculture and the allied occupations-somewhat projecting the “image of limited good.”
Rural communities, operating with a cluster of values, continue to maintain the institutions that account much for the inability to mobilize the productive forces in general. New avenues for participation in poverty reduction strategies can hardly address the problem of alienation of villagwrs associated with various occupations with agriculture as the main stay from the mainstream of capitalist economy at the centre moulded by the whirlpool of globalization.
Rural-friendly agricultural modernisation policy rather leads to the development of underdevelopment, reinforcing dependency syndrome in the countryside. Moreover, man-made crises along with natural calamities compel the victims of policy disaster to shift into cities.
Rural communities are liable to exploitation. The emerging comprador, interceding between the peasant and public administration, organises and disseminates a system of distribution that mirrors the fabric of capitalistic society. Modern urban centers, metropolitan or non-metropolitan, and even market-towns, function as “epiphenomenon” of dominant interests of the investors and trading communities and exploit the peripheries and hinterland.
Surplus, generated from productions, increases capital accumulation. In fact, rural economy has become “a part of the process of capitalistic concentration” with urban investors putting into agriculture. A large portion of surplus finds its way out of villages.
Added to this phenomenon is the flight of rural capital to the city. A huge stock of capital generated by production in the cropping and non-cropping sectors flows into major urban areas through market manipulation, credit recovery lines pestered with high interest and service charge, financial institutions, absentee landlordism and strategic power centers.
The deteriorating economic situation in the countryside shows up in scarcity of food, and production inputs. Rising competition in global scenario depresses rural economy. The irony is that primary producers of food crops have to purchase food at extremely high prices. Things are going in a reverse direction.
A volley of rural development measures of various development agencies has turned into a folly as the rural poor continue to be downtrodden by the onslaught of exploitation. Increasing marginalization of peasants upsets the policymakers. Spillover benefits of economic growth are scanty. Whatever little the vulnerable get in socially construed mechanism of allocation cannot be treated as legitimate share-something meaningful to add to their economic empowerment.
There is little hope of ending the exploitation of the rural peasants by the tycoons, the lumpen bourgeois and absentee landlords residing in the metropolitan areas, unless there is a strong advocacy for public policy to revamp rural economy for giving benefits to the interest of the peasants.
The stark reality is that some urban conglomerates having rural connections use local administration to maintain their position in economic structure. They have an unholy alliance with rich farmers, manipulating bargaining power in or outside the co-operatives.
A new approach to the development of rural economy is of utmost significance against exploitation. Conventional wisdom in local level planning is no use. We badly need economic de-centralisation to prop up revitalisation of rural economy.
We have so many smart programs operated by public promotional agencies and NGOs alike to “foster the creative energies and innovative drive of rural people.” There is no divergence of opinion about the efficient implementation of such programs so that rural economy flourishes from within to reduce poverty. Policymakers may go for the transformation of rural economy putting the poor first, of course, within a pragmatic policy fold.
Crisis at the micro level has accentuated due to globalisation. The outcome is accentuation of urbanisation of rural economy. This has to be restructured through urban decentralisation-creation of rural town with standard markets to help the primary producers and co-operative’s farmers.
Organisational strength is a must for empowering the poor and integrating them into the distribution profile. The rural poor, including small farmers and the landless, should be mobilised into collective institutions or in “loosely co-coordinated associations to upgrade their income and consumption levels.” There must be a policy to ensure their access to newly created organisational links that are expected to integrate rural economy to public administration. This is to minimise the gap between peasantry and the state.
True, rural economy is static with institutional stereotypes and semi-feudal trappings. Capitalist penetration is of course a recent phenomenon. Bangladesh rural economy is a prototype of Asiatic mode of production in a seemingly hydraulic structure.
Peasant economy is slow pitched, with inherent institutional cussedness. Rural poverty is endemic in a “traditional subsistence oriented economy.” It is in the grip of “vicious circle of poverty.” There is little capital investment for massive production in agriculture and entrepreneurial activities.
Introducing ambitious development schemes like ICT and modern infrastructure development in the prevailing economic environment will be less result oriented unless ground is prepared to re-dynamise rural economy. Promoting small investments focusing on “rural and agricultural sector” is a realistic policy capable of implementation.
No cut and dried policy will do. We ought to think that awakening of the rural population through policy planning needs restructuring of rural economy on a pattern acceptable to the villagers. Hunger and malnutrition are inevitable outcomes of under-utilisation and misappropriation of resources. There is a need for an objective policy analysis and advocacy to delve deeply into environment matters
The looming global disaster is a wake up call to Bangladesh. Our government needs to heed to acute global food shortage warning and think to take precautionary measures to face eventuality. In Bangladesh there has been sharp rise in the prices of sugar edible oil and wheat over a last couple of years. There is every possibility of further price hike if our government does not ponder over policy matter to combat crisis situation.. Things should not slip beyond its control in the case of the manipulation of criminal syndicates. They may frequently refer to global food crisis as a ploy to increase the prices of the essentials.
Food security ought to be tightened. Better think to ensure bumper production of Aman crop extending all help to the farmers. The primary producers deserve fair deal and protection of the state from the manipulation of the intermediaries. Take enough steps to create buffer stocks of food grains in view of the crisis engulfing the world economy.
But buffer stock operations to maintain price stabilization of food items in internal markets and to meet sticky situation of food crisis may be soaked with misappropriation. This corrupt practice is proverbial Food crisis loomed large in 2006. But the ruling politicians and bureaucrats unashamedly claimed there was no such crisis. Tactics of misappropriation that are at bureaucrats’ finger end also benefited the ministers. Food otherwise misappropriated was shown as a consignment on the way to a delivery point. Out of 603852 metric tons of food in buffer stock 201204 metric tons of food was shown as consignment on the way. Stories about sinking a barge with food in the river/sea and missing of truckloads of cereal are common and misleading. In reality food items were misappropriated (Bangladesh observer, 4th April 2006). At the local level of rural development village leaders branded as touts benefited from bureaucratic allocation that turned into misappropriation and bungling. This is evidenced from manifold stories of malpractice in public distribution system as in the case of subsidies in agriculture (fertilizer as a case), distribution of khas (government-owned) land, relief under Food for Works Programmes (FWP) and Money for Works Programmes (MWP), rural rationing and Vulnerable Group Feeding(VGD).So public distribution system should be purged of corruption and malpractice. Only beaten tracts in bureaucratic organization will not do. Think of way out to get rid of corruption and redynamize public bureaucracy and local leadership.
Food crisis has left many a person hungry. Nearly 1 billion people worldwide are affected by severe hunger and poverty. Many farmers rely on small plots of land (about one to two acres) for their food and income. The goal agriculture development is to help these farming families produce more food and increase their income, while preserving the land for future generations.
According to reports ‘from the 1960s to 1980s, the “Green Revolution” in Asia and Latin America-a sweeping effort to transform farming methods and improve staple crops such as maize, wheat, and rice-helped to double food production and saved hundreds of millions of lives.’Many governments and donors subsequently shifted their attention to other concerns, believing that the problem of inadequate food supply in the developing world had been solved. This was not the case in Sub-Saharan Africa, however, where some Green Revolution approaches were tried but failed. Meanwhile, in the intervening years, population growth, rising incomes, dwindling natural resources, and a changing climate have caused food prices to rise and agricultural productivity has once again become strained. Many of those affected are smallholder farmers. Three-quarters of the world’s poorest people get their food and income by farming small plots of land about the size of a football field. Most of them barely get by-struggling with unproductive soil, plant diseases, pests, and drought. Their livestock are frequently weak or sick. Reliable markets for their products and good information about pricing are hard to come by, and government policies rarely serve their interests well.These factors, in turn, put millions of families at risk for poverty and hunger as well as malnutrition-the world’s most serious health problem and the single biggest contributor to child mortality. At the same time, one consequence of the first Green Revolution-excessive fertilizer use leading to water pollution-underscores the importance of sustainability to safeguard both environmental and human health.
Helping farmers improve their yields requires a comprehensive approach that includes the use of seeds that are more resistant to disease, drought, and flooding; information from trusted local sources about more productive farming techniques and technologies; greater access to markets; and government policies that serve the interests of farming families.
Agricultural development must also address gender disparities. In Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, women are vital contributors to farm work, but because they have less access to improved seeds, better techniques and technologies, and markets, yields on their plots are typically 20 to 40 percent lower than on plots farmed by men. Addressing this gap can help households become more productive and reduce malnutrition within poor families.
Policy makers should think to encourage sustainable agricultural practices. In an era of increasingly scarce resources and growing impact of climate change, we encourage farmers to embrace and adopt sustainable practices that help them grow more with less land, water, fertilizer, and other costly inputs while preserving natural resources for future generations. We are committed to communicating our strategy more effectively and sharing what we’ve learned with grantees and other partners, including governments, nongovernmental organizations, traditional and emerging donors, and the private sector. Our resources, while significant, represent only a fraction of what is needed. Collaborating effectively with others maximizes our collective impact in helping farming families.
(Dr. Md. Shairul Mashreque, Professor of Public Administration, Chittagong University and Dr. Amir M. Nasrullah, Associate Professor of Public Administration, Chittagong University)
