Why Himachal Pradesh farmers are better off than tillers in Uttarakhand

A striking feature of the poll campaign in Uttarakhand is that neither of the two major political parties have any concrete strategy for a crisis that's haunting nearly half the state's population.Since 2000, when the state was created, foodgrain production has gone down by 6% and land under cultivation by 11%. In neighbouring Himachal Pradesh, with similar mountainous terrain, foodgrain output increased by 29% while the country averaged a 28%.

“Life as we knew it is finished,“ says Pravin Kandari, an elderly farmer from Agrakhal village, not far from the Tehri dam. “There's no water, no seeds or fertilisers, nobody to buy the anaaj, nowhere to take it to sell. My sons now work in a hotel in Rudrapur.“

The state's average foodgrain figures hide a bigger tragedy . Included in this is the output from the plains comprising Rudrapur, Udham Singh Nagar and Haridwar districts and Dehradun and Nainital districts. This makes up a stunning 60% of the state's total foodgrain output. The remaining 11 hill districts, with roughly half the population -and half the assembly seats -produce the remaining 40%, including millets and pulses.

Dinesh Pratap, professor at Dehradun's DAV College, told TOI that mountain agriculture was always a low level subsistence economy just about able to support the much smaller local population. “With no jobs in rural areas, people have migrated in large numbers to cities like Dehradun, even Delhi. This has put agriculture in terminal decline. There's no-one to tend the fields or livestock.Wild animals freely destroy whatever is sown,“ he says.

But Uttarakhand has been showing a growth rate of over 10% for several years. This is due to the secondary sector, especially construction and manufacturing that have been galloping. Agriculture's share in the state's domestic product has halved from about 22% in 2004-05 to 11% in 2015-16. And, since most manufacturing is in the plains, those in the mountains don't benefit.

Conceding the difficulty , BK Joshi, former vice chancellor of Kumaon University , said the state's governments have lacked “vision“. “It's possible to introduce highvalue fruits and vegetables, aromatic and medicinal plants, etc. to boost returns.But this needs extensive planning, hard work. That's why in the polls, you don't see solutions on offer,“ he told TOI.A comparison with Himachal confirms the policy failure.With just 2% more area under horticulture, HP produces a jaw dropping 37% more fruits, vegetables, flowers, medicinal plants etc. Small wonder that farmers in HP are not in the same abyss as in Uttarakhand.