Cabinet to clear hike in MSP of Kharif crops next week: PM Narendra Modi

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has assured farmers that the Cabinet meeting next week would approve the new Minimum Support Prices (MSP) that would fetch farmers 150% of the input costs.

“The Prime Minister announced that the Union Cabinet would approve the implementation of Minimum Support Price of 150% of the input cost, in its forthcoming meeting, for the notified crops of Kharif season 2018-19. This would ensure a significant boost to the income of farmers,” Modi said in an interaction with 140 farmers who had come to Delhi from UP, Uttarakhand, Punjab, Maharashtra and Karnataka, according to a statement from the Prime Minister’s Office.

The Centre would also recommend a sugarcane price within two weeks and that states had been asked to make sure that farmers are paid their dues for cane already sold to mills, it said.


Farmers have been anxiously waiting for the promised increase in the MSP, which gives them an assurance of the price at which they sell their produce and helps them decide which crop would be the most suitable for them to plant.

Farmer organisations have demanded an early announcement about the support price for the ongoing kharif season, in which crops like paddy, oilseeds, pulses and cotton are planted by farmers after the onset of the monsoon. This year’s monsoon is forecast to be normal, which is expected to lead to higher planting.

Modi told farmers that the corporate sector has also been urged to invest in areas that would support farmers. “The Prime Minister apprised farmers of his recent interactions with corporates, where he has called for greater private sector investment for value addition, warehousing, storage facilities, better quality seeds, and market linkages for improving farmers income,” the statement said.

The government has taken several steps to help mills pay arrears to farmers. Modi told farmers that the Centre would recommend a higher “Fair and Remunerative Price” for cane. “He said that this will also be higher than the 2017-18 price. It will also provide incentive for those farmers whose recovery from sugarcane will be higher than 9.5%,” the statement said.