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following the Fifth Pay Commission recommendations in 1997. Recognising
the immediate need for reforming and revitalising the moribund agricultural
extension system, the Department of Agriculture had formulated a centrally-
sponsored scheme called the
Support to State Extension Programmes for
Extension Reforms.
This scheme, launched in 2005-06, aimed at making
the extension system farmer-driven and accountable to farmers by way of an
innovative institutional arrangement for technology dissemination in the form
of an Agricultural Technology Management Agency (ATMA) at district level. The
ATMA scheme itself was a replication of the model of extension services which
was successfully piloted under the National Agricultural Technology Project
(NATP). It aimed at converging resources at the grassroots level (district, blocks
and villages) through involvement of farmers, subject-matter specialists, NGOs,
Krishi Vigyan Kendras
(KVKs) and others (Planning Commission, June 2005,
p.201).
Second, during 2005-06, a National Horticultural Mission (NHM)
became operational, extending beyond fruits and vegetables and embracing
medicinal plants and spices. Agricultural diversification was accepted as a
major goal which involved a shift of land from cereals to non-cereals, from
crop agriculture to animal husbandry (dairy and fisheries).
Third, a
National Fund for Basic and Strategic Research in Agricultural
Sciences
got set up in 2005-06. Simultaneously, the National Agricultural
Innovation Project was launched in the Indian Council for Agricultural Research
in July 2006. Both of these had placed the activities of agricultural research in
project mode (Planning Commission 2008, p.10).
Fourth, the terms of trade for agricultural began to improve in 2004-05
after rapid increases in international prices of agricultural commodities. This
was the time when agriculture trade was opened up by the Indian government
under WTO. There were also reforms of agricultural marketing after the Union
Ministry of Agriculture formulated a model Agricultural Product Marketing
Committee (APMC) Act in 2003whichwould allownewmarkets to be established
by private entities or cooperatives, as also permit direct marketing as well as
contract farming. After 2005-06, a number of state governments, as many as
20, have amended their APMC Acts introducing various degrees of flexibility
and reforms on the lines of the model legislature (Planning Commission 2008,
p.23).
Fifth, with a view to making the growth to be all inclusive, the agricultural
strategy tried to “focus on the 85% of farmers who are small and marginal,
increasingly female, and who find it difficult to access inputs, credit and
