AGRICULTURE, INNOVATION AND THE DEVELOPMENT BURDEN Third IndiaLICS International Conference on Innovation and Sustainable Development -Plenary Session- Southern Perspectives 3/18/2016R.S.Raina, CSIR-NISTADS

To see agriculture and innovation – development burden Development - policy goal, alternatives Policies based on ‘theoretical expectations’ (Lewis path) or based on ‘empirical realities’? Innovation to achieve these policy goals??? Evolution of Indian agriculture and the development burden – agriculture and the articulation of development - three phases – the key actors - the intermediate regime- persistence Innovation systems for sustainable agriculture- not mere agricultural production systems New institutions (rules, norms, values) re-shaping the human-food-environment relationships….and building opportunities for change. 3/18/2016R.S.Raina, CSIR-NISTADS

Agricultural Policy Goal 4% growth rate ?? Minimizing nutritional inequalities I am asking for national policy of food, agriculture and nutrition, that can be implemented on a decentralized basis, taking full account of local resources, availabilities, costs, preferences and traditions and has for its objective the minimization of nutritional inequalities among the people, irrespective of their money incomes and their urban or rural residence. (Rao, 1982, p.137) Re-visit the specifications -Burkean pentadic...the act, agent, context, agency, purpose 3/18/2016R.S.Raina, CSIR-NISTADS

Three phases of Indian agriculture -based on the growth rates of agriculture??? Or -based on the relationship between the state and agriculture - (a) by the ‘intermediate regime’ actors and (b) their articulation and institutionalization of development Nehruvian phase -“agriculture as the basis of all development” (post-independence till mid-1960s) Green revolution phase - “modernization of agriculture for development” (mid-1960s to late- 1990s) Strong contenders phase – “agriculture and alternatives in development” (late-1990s till date) 3/18/2016R.S.Raina, CSIR-NISTADS

Innovation- supported by state capitalism....Lewis path? or trap? Land productivity – rapid increase (till ), slower growth, stagnation since Arable land per farmer – declines K calories produced per ha. – rapid increase (Dorin, etal 2014) Value-added per worker (cultivator + main worker) – declines Intensification - Fossil fuel substitutes labour; max. 40% of NSA; massive ecological footprint Prevalent “production investments and technological capacities” dictate options…worsening rural unemployment and poverty…. increasing rural workforce … no industrial or service sector jobs….violence, state subsidies, reservations,… 3/18/2016R.S.Raina, CSIR-NISTADS

....environmental stress...evident since the mid- 1970s....in the context of ‘production capacities’ and sustainability. 3/18/2016R.S.Raina, CSIR-NISTADS

Innovation in and for Agriculture in the Environment Knowledge intensive agro-ecological alternatives -high productivity per ha., and per worker (KBBE approaches) Labour using and high biological-synergy alternatives (SRI, organic farming, agro-ecological production systems, etc. )- value-networks (not value-chains) Public investments (to replace subsidies) + Scale- effects enabled for high value-added per worker Regional and local agri-food systems; with policy goals of minimal nutritional inequality and policy instruments that foster decentralized innovation capacities. 3/18/2016R.S.Raina, CSIR-NISTADS