As the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) of the United Nations Representative
in India and as a co-organiser of this National Dialogue on Indian Agriculture
Towards 2030, the FAO India team is honoured to have had this opportunity for a
unique collaboration on the policy front. Our collaborators for this National Dialogue
have been the NITI Aayog and the Ministry of Agriculture and Farmers' Welfare,
Government of India. We also had the kind cooperation of two other ministries of
the Government of India-the Ministry of Jal Shakti and the Ministry of Fisheries
and Animal Husbandry and Dairying.
We startedworking on this Dialogue in 2019. Thiswas a time when the government
was itself considering a directional change in India's agricultural laws and policies.
There was agreement within the highest levels in government that a new post-Green
Revolution vision for the next decade was needed. The Honourable Vice-President,
in his inaugural address at the National Dialogue and in the Foreword to this book,
reiterates the direction for the needed change.
A Steering Committee under the guidance of the Member Agriculture of NITI
Aayog was put together to guide the National Dialogue. The composition of the
Committee embodied expertise and experience in several aspects of agri-food
systems. Several scenarios on why and how India's agriculture sector should be
further improved were discussed in the Steering Committee meetings.
The Steering Committee commissioned a set of discussion papers on different
themes related to Indian agriculture to get perspectives from a range of stakeholders
in the agri-food sector. These were presented at a national conference held during
19-22 January 2021 and were also made available online. The COVID-19 pandemic
prevented us from having a large in-person event, but a virtual event allowed an
equally large number to participate. The thematic discussion papers were revised on
the basis of the feedback received at the conference and they now form the various
chapters of this book.
