Updated on 06 April 2022

This blog is a work in progress… and hope I can update this blog with videos, pictures, links  etc over a period of time … but overall the main points remain the same.

By the end of this blog it should be crystal clear to you why farmer suicide happens in India.

If you know a farmer or a person interested to take up farming please share this blog with him… it could save his life.

Success of a farm depends upon 4 main areas of activity and each of them is an art by itself:

A- Crop Growing
B – Crop Storage
C- Crop Marketing (advertising)
D – Crop Selling

To be a successful all farmers need to have good knowledge in the above 4 points.. but unfortunately almost all of the farmers fail miserably in all 4 of the above… they are also very bad at crop growing forget about Storage, Marketing & Selling.

This is true else Farms would not have been in such serious condition. Many have great difficulty even in the first stage – the crop growing stage.

It is the farmers responsibility to not only Grow but, to store the harvest, reach out to potential customers & finally sell the produce. If he is growing more than he can store or sell then it is his fault. So either he should grow less or grow something else or create storage facilities.

Mobile app creators can help the farmers with creating C & D which is crop marketing and crop selling applications (APP). Of course there are a lot of social media apps that can increase the reach of the farmer but none of the apps out there can do things like what Amazon does for manufacturers.

What is needed is an App like Amazon that caters to just ORGANIC FARM PRODUCE- like Fruits, Vegetables, Ghee, Honey, Grains, Dal, Pickles, Sauces, Hand made Incense sticks etc

Other than that the biggest problem that farmers face occur during the Crop Growing stage or cultivation stage – the stage from seeding to harvesting. This is the biggest hurdle which all farmers have to cross every single year. They lay their life on the line every single year.

Traditional Farming: Traditional farming is no longer traditional. Meaning the method of traditional farming has been unconsciously manipulated in such a calculated way by MNC companies that farmers feel that they cannot farm using traditional methods. Most of the farmers feel that their soil is not good enough to grow anything. They do not realize that they reached this stage by using inorganic chemicals on their farms. They used unnatural seeds (both hybrid & genetically manipulated), plants, animals, poultry & even fishes on the farm. The farmers today have completely abandoned practices which ensured their survival for thousands of years and each farmer was taught & trained and farming knowledge was passed down the generations and were practiced just like a religion. Today all this knowledge is lost and forgotten. Due to this Farming has become one of the most expensive & laborious business in the world.

Today a farmer needs roughly Rs 100,000 to farm 1 acre:

• cost of SEEDS Rs 30,000
• cost of LABOR during seeding, weeding & harvest Rs 30,000
• cost of diesel, fertilizers & pesticides Rs 30,000
• cost of Loan or interest on loan Rs 10,000
• cost of Transportation to APMC mandi Rs 10,000

Thus Rs 20K+30K+30K+10K+10K = Rs100,000 is cost of farming 1 Acre of land.

When he sells the harvest he might get Rs 115,000 meaning he gets a profit of mere Rs 15,000 for 3 to 9 months of hard work. If calculated for 3 months this is just Rs 5,000/month. Its even less for longer months.

Raw Deal during Bad Weather: Sometimes there is bad weather where pests, hail, rain or flooding could destroy the crops. In such a scenario the farmer does not get even 50% of his investment back.

Raw Deal during Good Weather: Other times when the climate is good the prices in the Mandi (APMC markets controlled by politicians) fall to Rs1/kg. One of the reasons for this fall due to the supply is many times more than the demand of the Mandis.

Mimimum Support Price (BULLSHIT): Due to the above sometimes the farmers get so frustrated that they throw their produce under the truck. Sometimes the Mandi agents know that farmers will not be able to pay to transport the produce back to their farm and also because the farmers do not have their own trucks or vehicles. So the MandiAgents do not hesitate to reduce their purchase price.

Thus most of the time the farmers have no option but to sell their produce at a very low price and that too below the Minimum Support Price (MSP).

MSP too is set according to the monsoon & weather. If there was good rainfall and the weather was good and not extreme then the prices are set lower. When there is less rainfall or bad weather like storm or untimely rainfall and the produce is expected to be less then the MSP is set higher.

Thus during both the good climate and the bad climate the farmers get a raw deal.

When the farmer does not get back his investment which usually is taken as a loan from banks or from very-high-interest open market then he has no other option than to commit suicide.

Some of the reasons of their failure are:

• Not using Heirloom Seeds, not having a seed-bank & dependence on Hi-bred, Hi-yield or GMO seeds. Heirloom seeds are seeds that have passed down thousands of years from generation to generation. They have survived because of their disease resistance abilities. Remember, heirloom refers to the heritage of a plant, while organic refers to a growing practice.

• Use of free seeds handed out by anybody – govt or non-govt. If you are getting FREE seeds slap your face and ask why anybody will give you free seeds? Least of all the govt! Heirloom seeds are usually given out by the farmer with a condition that if you take 1 Kg seeds then you will return 1kg back to him. Thus this is not free while there are some companies and agencies which hand out free seeds to the farmers. Stay away from them. The govt doesn’t want to pay you a fair price for the crop you harvested but has the generosity to give you free seeds!!! BEWARE of free seeds. These seeds are used by foreign companies to destroy Indian Agriculture. Indian Agriculture is a POWERHOUSE, it is so huge that the industrialized countries cannot compete with Indian agriculture… not because we are great but only because India as a country is geographically… perfectly placed to not only grow more food than any country in the world but also we are placed in the center of the MAP… so that we can distribute food easily to all corners of the world. From ancient times India has had excellent trading ties with all countries having sea-ports in the world.

Never use hi-bred seeds, poultry, fish, animal, etc because the result is the same – DISEASE… they are unhealthy and cannot withstand disease.

• Monocrop-ing – growing one crop in a large area. Just like crop takes in nutrients as food it excretes its shit into the soil. In a forest where many plants grow together different plant excrete different kind of shit into the soil. These are absorbed by other plants as nutrients just like they absorb dung and urine. In such a scenario of MultiCrops or multi layer crop additional nutrients are not even required. MutiLayer crop is a system where crops of different height or different harvesting period are grown together.

WEEDING?

• WEEDING – What are Weeds? Weeds are any plant that grows without a farmer’s intention to grow it especially in an area where he has planted some crop. If weeds would have grown along with the crop then at least it would not have been a Monocrop, but even that has been removed by the farmers. Weeds and grass should NEVER be removed unless it is pulling down your crops. Weeds provide different kind of nutrition to the plants growing around it. Most of the weeds have tap roots and are excellent in water harvesting and providing life and shade to the soil. Weeds are the last step before the land becomes a desert. Most of the farms today look like a desert after the farmer has ploughed it. You can see more soil than greenery. By removing weeds you are destroying soil so remove them only when it is impossible. Removal of weeds also increases labour time and money.

• Not harvesting rain water – Water is life and Water is equal to Money. Countries which have more fresh water are rich and countries who have less freshwater are poor. (The only exception to this is countries with huge Crude Oil or Coal deposits).  All crops need water. All farmers get much more water during monsoon but the farmer allows it to flow away. Now imagine water as money and you are not collecting it when it falls… if you don’t collect money when it falls on your house or farm and allow it to flow away then you will have no money. The farmer got the money in the form of rain… but he allowed it to flow away. Every farm should harvest rain water and every farm should have a pond (without liner – plastic liners prevent the percolation of rainwater underground and do not aid water harvesting underground). The function of ponds is to collect the surface runoff and send it underground over a period of time. Most farms with pond have a good water table and look much more green than farms without a pond. Most farms without pond have Tube well. Never buy a farm with tube well because tube wells are danger signals which indicate that the farm in ICU or on VENTILATOR. Tubewells mean that the farm is on the brink of collapse or desertification. Never buy farms with TubeWells because tubewells are signs of “water scarcity”.
• Farms should allocate at least 10% of its land as a pond. If the pond dries up before the next monsoon then dig it another meter deep and keep doing that every year till there is sufficient water all year round. Usually 6 ft to 10 ft deep ponds are more than sufficient.

• Usage of Chemical fertilizers & pesticides. In an attempt to provide nutrition to the plants or kill the pests the farmer also ends up killing the insects and the good bacteria in the soil which were responsible for providing the nutrients to the plants. Over a period of time the farm soil becomes like the soil in the desert just sand without any bacteria, insects or worms in it. So if the farmer has to grow anything on it he will need fertilizers and since the soil is itself unhealthy the plants too will fall prey to disease easily.
• Farmer doesn’t understand why Plants gets disease and reason for PESTS. Just like we humans get disease because the food we eat lacks nutrition the Plants also gets disease because the soil from which they eat or draw their “food” lacks nutrition. This has happened because the farmer has sprayed dangerous chemicals and poison on the farm. This destroys the micro organisms in the soil which is responsible to build the soil. Thus the soil looses more and more nutrition every year. If a farm grew 1,000kg of crops/food it means it converted 1,000 kg of nutrients into food. If this amount of nutrients are not delivered back to the soil naturally then there will be a short fall of nutrients and every harvest the land will become more and more barren. Weed removal by farmers multiplies the damage because weeds only crop up upon barren land/areas to protect the land, pump back nutrients deep into the soil with their tap-root and reduce the temperature of the land.
• Pests attack the plant because it is nature’s way of indicating that that plant is un-nutritious or unhealthy and not fit for human consumption. It also tells you that there is something seriously wrong with the seed or the land or both. Most of the time the problem is with the seed. Seeds which have been manipulated by humans pick up various unexpected traits and weeds. The heirloom seeds have very little problems because over thousands of years they have improved their health developed the resistance to most kind of diseases.
• There are only 2 reasons for Plants catching Disease & Pest: i) Unhealthy soil ii) Unhealthy Seed

i) Unhealthy Soil – Either the farmer is destroying the soil with inorganic chemical & pesticide use or the earlier owner of the farm was doing it. The only way out is to understand the soil and cure the soil first before he proceeds.

ii) Unhealthy Seed – The Seeds Hi-bred or GMO. – Using these seeds the chances of crop failure is VERY high unless you follow the company directions and use the company specified fertilizers and the company specified pesticides. All farmer suicides have happen with farmers using such seeds. You cannot buy a different brand than those specified by them because these seeds are “designer seeds” and designed to perform along with only certain type of chemicals. Most of these fertilisers & pesticides are manufactured by these seed companies themselves or their sister-companies. The success of SeedCompanies, Fertiliser Companies & Pesticide Companies are ENTIRELY dependent on destruction of your farm soil.

If your farm soil is very healthy then even hi-bred crops might grow without the use of chemical fertilisers or pesticides. So these companies ensure that these seeds are sprayed with such organic or chemical fertilisers & pesticides that it will destroy your farm soil and the farmer become addicted and dependent on these inorganic chemicals like a drug addict or a slave and end up in buying more and more of the chemicals every year by these companies throughout the farmer’s life.

One example: Sri Lanka had barred a Chinese ship carrying desperately needed organic fertilizer that experts found to be tainted with harmful bacteria.

https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/south-asia/sri-lanka-bans-contaminated-chinese-fertiliser/articleshow/87236171.cmshttp://hinese-fertiliser/articleshow/87236171.cms

 Chinese company, Qingdao Seawin Biotech Co Ltd, supplied contaminated organic fertilizers to Lankan farmers. Colombo rejected the consignment on the grounds that the samples contained a deadly bacteria called Erwinia which destroys crops. Erwinia aphidocola had decimated fifty percent of a bean crop in Spain in late 2003.

So this means as long as you are not making the organic fertiliser on the farm itself you will not get good results. If you are buying organic fertilisers there are chances that you could even damage your farm as Srilanka learned with Chinese Organic Fertilisers.

• Non-use of Biogas digesters – Biogas Digesters are a must for every Farm. They help to create healthy soil from the effluent of the digester and the biogas to either cook or to power generators for electricity or even to power CNG car.
• Dependence on Vermi-Compost. Vermicompost has 2 serious issues

i) it is labour intensive to a certain extent that you need to first create the compost and then move the compost around the farm.

ii) The worms used in VermiCompost are surface feeders and do not burrow the soil. Thus they do not help in rainwater harvesting.

Usually earthworms move the soil and also burrow the soil many feet down and help in rainwater harvesting in monsoon and later for root propagation. So if you can provide fresh dung and urine on the farm the earthworms will do both work.

• Not using Bulls for Plough-ing. – How will the farmer get fresh dung & urine on the farm? One of the way is using bulls for plough-ing the farm. During this activity the soil gets dung and the plough spreads it around and maximizes its effect.
• Use of dried dung. Dung is useful ONLY because of the bacteria present in it. As the dung dries out the good bacteria dies leaving the dung dried and hard. At this point the dung is good only for burning or fire and nothing else.
• Not keeping large animals on the farm. Forget large animals today most farms lack any kind of animals except the cow which lives all its life in a cow shed which resembles more of a toilet-shed (shouchalya) than a cowshed (gau-shalaya). It is very important that a lot of animals have to be kept overnight on the farm at least once if not a week after each harvest.
• Not practicing Kraal-ing. Kraal is where the animals are kept on the farm in small areas overnight. The best method to keep animals on the farm is to keep a lot of animals in small paddock like areas and then to move them to the next paddock every day. This is done so that a lot of dung and urine fall in small areas at a time. This areas where the dung & urine has fallen should be seeded left undisturbed till the grass or crops in that area has grown back till a foot in height. The cattle may be brought back to that area to repeat the kraal-ing.
• Not utilizing the services of Chickens & Ducks. – Just like the earthworm and cattle each insect, animal or bird has a very specific role to play in the success of a farm. Chickens & ducks have the job of inspecting each and every plant and their roots on the farm for pests. Ducks have to do it even in water. They can do this only if you allow them to free range. They cannot do this in battery cages. They do this job without asking for any salary or payment yet you prevent them.
• Getting Subsidy Trapped – Subsidies are traps – There is no free lunch and similarly subsidies are also not free… subsidies there for a reason… the reason is to lure you. Just imagine who comes up with the idea of Subsidies – govt or industralist? When a certain industry starts from zero there is no subsidy. Take example of electric vehicles. Initially when EVs started to be produced in India there was no subsidy. Then govt started giving subsidy… but not for all vehicles… Govt gives subsidy ONLY for FAST electric Vehicles and not for slow EVs… meaning Govt gives subsidy ONLY for certain vehicles made by certain groups… is it surprising these groups are big Indian Industrialists existing from Independence and with great political clout. If the actual intention was to reduce petrol usage then subsidies would have been given for both slow & fast eScooters. This is the same scenario in every industry… subsidies are NOT to help the farmers… subsidies are there to help the Industrialists. It is because they fund the political rallies of these politicians. Most of the time the process itself of getting the subsidy and plans are all prepared by these industrialists and given to the Govt to announce to the people. It doesn’t benefit the Govt nor does it benefit the people. Only industrialists benefit from these subsidies.
• Not using Solar Energy to power house or farm equipment and becoming completely dependent upon government provided electricity. So many times the electricity which they get is at odd hours and even that too can be cut off any day. Every farm should be self sustainable in Energy, Water & Soil-health. Many times there will be storage or cutting machines which will require round the clock power. Having power-cuts are unacceptable on farms.
• Using expensive Diesel to power various equipments and vehicles on the farm. It makes a lot of economical sense to shift to electric power but for that to happen these farms must install solar power and portable batteries. They should also use electric vehicle on the farm which can double up as a tractor too.
• Practicing Non-Integrated Farming. – It is always better for a farm to have all activites together – eg Agriculture, Dairy, Poultry, Fish, Agro Products & Farm products. Agriculture, Dairy, Poultry & Fish directly depend on each other for their success. Having agro product & farm product manufacturing will improve the utilisation of manpower on the farm.
• Dependence on Single Point of Sale (APMC). This has been lifted by the Modi Govt in 2020 but still many times farmers due to various reasons have no option but to bring their produce to APMC to try to sell and some times they get very unfair price like Rs 1/kg although the official Minimum Support Price (MSP) will be like Rs 10/kg. This usually happens when the harvest is good. Therefore GOOD HARVEST is bad for selling farm produce. MSP increases when crops are damaged by unseasonal raining or flooding. But during this time very few farmers get a harvest. Therefore when ever they go to these APMC mandis they will ONLY get LOSS. Many times they don’t even get money to transport these goods back so they are forced to either sell it there or throw it under the trucks.
• Lack of Storage Facility
• Lack of Marketing Awareness or Ability. Farm Produce Marketing App development is very slow and not a single good app exists right now.
• Lack of transportation facility.
• Using expensive Hi-Tech systems instead of low cost methods.
• Lack of knowledge not because being illiterate but more because of not questioning and repeating unprofitable farming practices.