It’s a question of दाल-भात (doll-rice in Anglo-Indianese).  Indians are perhaps  the world’s largest eaters of pulses, but alas! Shrinking  land for crops and drought are making Indians think of leasing  agricultural land in Africa and Burma (Myanmar) to meet growing demand of the domestic market.

Two consecutive years of drought have led to a sharp drop in pulse production. As a result, some pulses have been selling at Rs200 a kilogram in the past few months—up by over 30%. Rising food prices, in turn, have fuelled retail inflation. In May, the consumer price inflation rose to 5.76%, the highest in 21 months.

The government of India is exploring opportunities to import and take up contract-farming with countries such as Mozambique, Malawi, and Burma. “We may cultivate pulses there or sign a long-term agreement (to procure). For this, we are sending a team to Mozambique and another to Myanmar,” India’s food minister Ram Vilas Paswan told a news channel.

Earlier this week,  Hem Pande, secretary of consumer affairs, went to Mozambique. “to  explore both short-term and long-term measures to import pulses from Mozambique on a government-to-government basis,” the consumer affairs ministry said in a statement.

Meanwhile, the Narendra Modi government is  scrambling to deal with food shortages.

On June 15 the government decided to import a volume equal to the gap between the demand and supply of pulses. Next day, the government ordered imports of some 0.65 million tonnes from Burma and some African nations.

Until now, traders have also resorted to importing these pulses, but it hasn’t solved the problem.  So far in 2016, private traders have imported three million tonnes of pulses, compared to the 5.79 million tonnes imported in entire 2015, according to the Indian Pulses and Grains Association.

India is estimated to have produced 18.32 million tonnes of pulses  in the crop year, which ran from July 2015 to June 2016. Demand, meanwhile, stood at nearly 24 million tonnes. Pulses in India typically are mussorie dal, tur, gram, moong, and urad, among others. They form a substantial part of the Indian diet.

“Over time, supply of pulses has failed to catch up with demand. Production remained stagnant for nearly seven years since fiscal 2004, while demand accelerated, causing per capita availability of pulses to decline and prices to spiral,” Dharmakirti Joshi, chief economist at Crisil, a ratings agency, told an Indian newspaper.

Contract farming

Earlier attempts by India’s private sector to enter contract-farming overseas , too, haven’t quite succeeded.

In 2009,  eight Indian firms had formed a consortium to purchase or lease land in Uruguay in South America, and grow pulses and soya bean. The global slowdown, however, made these investments unviable and the plans never materialised.

Africa is a volatile continent, with many of the countries there being risky investments.  “Stability of governments and financial viability are factors which make Indian business think ten times before buying land in African nations,” B V Mehta, executive director of the Solvent Extractors Association of India, part of the 2009 consortium, was quoted as saying.

But, the Indian government needs to find a way out as cities expand, population keeps on growing, and less food is being farmed….

  Africa, agriculture, food, Indian Pulses and Grains Association, Malawi, Myanmar