The All-India Kisan Sabha (AIKS) has demanded that the Union government launch a project on the lines of the Ayyankali Urban Employment Guarantee Scheme in Kerala for dairy farmers across the country.
This was part of proposals conceived at a two-day national workshop of the organisation, which concluded here on Sunday. AIKS functionaries pointed out that ensuring jobs for at least 100 days for all farmers with two cows would energise the dairy sector. They said that while farmers in Kerala were getting ₹38 for a litre of milk, their counterparts in other States were being given only between ₹22 and ₹30.
Cattle markets should be expanded and bull calf rearing promoted. It was pointed out that 52.5 lakh farmers in the country had left the sector between 2014 and 2019. Participants at the workshop also said that farmers should get the benefit of value-added products from milk. The delegates came down on the neo-liberal economic polices of the Centre, which, they said, were pushing farmers into a crisis. The workshop decided to form federations of dairy farmers in all States and later form a national organisation.
Opening the workshop on Saturday, Ashok Dhawale, national president, AIKS, said that the Samyukt Kisan Morcha, the conglomeration of farmers’ unions that recently forced the Centre to withdraw three farm laws after a long-drawn-out agitation, was planning to launch another phase of strike seeking minimum support price and insurance coverage for crops, and a one-time loan waiver.
