MGNREGA luring away labour from farm fields: Study

BANGALORE: Besides creating labour shortage in the agriculture sector, cost of farm production increased by up to 20 per cent in Karnataka after the implementation of MGNREGA, the Centre's flagship programme aimed at alleviating poverty, says a new study.

The study by the Institute for Social and Economic Change here stated that after the implementation of the job scheme, in majority of villages shortage of labour in agriculture was observed during kharif sowing season of July, August and September.

The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act came into operation in February 2006.

"Majority of the villagers were of the view that after implementation of the scheme, cost of production in agriculture has increased by 10 to 20 per cent because of scarcity of labour," said the study titled 'Impact of NREGA on Wage Rate, Food Security and Rural Urban Migration in Karnataka (2011)."

Authors of the study, Pramod Kumar, professor and head, Agriculture Development and Rural Transformation Centre (ADRTC), and I Maruthi of ADRTC of ISEC, said daily wages in the farm sector have also increased by 50 per cent after the implementation of the scheme.

"Works taken up under MGNREGA should be planned in such a way that labours are strictly employed for the scheme after the sowing and harvesting seasons of Rabi and Kharif crops are over. This planning has to be done at the panchayat, block and district levels depending upon the cropping pattern of the respective regions," they said.

The researchers studied performance of the scheme in villages of Bidar, Bellary, Chamarajanagar, Chikmagalur and Dharwad districts with a sample of 254 households.

"A clear majority of households indicated the scheme has not been successful in raising their living standards or their consumption levels and the reasons were that the programme has not provided enough number of days of work to make a significant dent on the poverty level," it said.