Watch: Budget 2024: What’s in it for agriculture?
Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said she has allocated about ₹ 1.50 lakh crore to the agriculture sector.
Almost all major schemes for farmers have seen an increase in allocation compared to her previous budgets. However, the fertilisers subsidy is down by about ₹1 lakh crore when compared to the actual expenditure in 2022-23. To address the price rise, the Finance Ministry has also provided ₹ 10,000 crore to the price stabilisation fund. Farmers are supposed to get a benefit of this fund. In the last budget, the allocation for this fund was just ₹ 10 lakh.
The fertilisers ministry will get about ₹1.64 lakh crore in this financial year. In 2022-23, the Ministry spent about ₹2.51 lakh crore to ensure fertilisers for farmers. It has to be seen how farmers’ organisations such as the Samyukt Kisan Morcha will look into these suggestions especially when their demand for a statutory minimum support price did not find place in the this budget too.
