Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley in his budget has announced a lot of incentives and spending on agriculture, rural economy, road & rail infrastructure and poverty alleviation, which is commendable and will help in boosting rural productivity and consumption. Some major announcements include raising of farm credit to Rs 10 lakh crore, raising of allocation towards Fasal Bima Yojana, the commitment to double income of farmers in 5 years, setting up of Dairy Processing Infrastructure Fund and Micro-irrigation Fund under NABARD, highest ever allocation of Rs 48,000 crore for MGNREGA, all are welcome. However, I did not see much of incentives for fisheries or aquaculture given Blue Revolution’ is the next big thing which our Prime Minister is aspiring after Green’ & White’ revolutions in the country. In comparison to an allocation for schemes under Green Revolution (Rs 13,741 crore) and White Revolution (Rs 1,634 crore) in the budget, Blue Revolution has been allocated with only Rs 401 crore. Fisheries do not enjoy the same benefits as agriculture, despite the sector coming under the purview of Agriculture Ministry. It is high time for the government to set up a Fisheries Ministry to oversee the growth of the sector. Aqua-farming and seafood processing are capital intensive activities. We were expecting tax incentives for aqua-farming and seafood processing, which would have helped towards bringing down the cost of operations and make seafood more affordable, considering it is the cheapest source of healthy proteins. There is an announcement about introducing a new modern legislation on contract farming. However, it remains to be seen if aqua-farming sector could be one of its beneficiaries. Indian fisheries and aquaculture contributes to more than 6 percent of the global fish production, more than 1 percent of the GDP, more than 5 percent of the agriculture GDP and providing employment to 14 million people.
2017 Business Standard Private Ltd.