news from the cpi(m)
*RESOLUTION*
*Adopted at the*
*National Convention*
*For The Right to Food And Against Price Rise*
*August 26, New Delhi*
This Convention for the Right to Food and against Price Rise
Expresses deep concern
At the relentless rise in the prices of essential commodities.
The prices of rice, wheat, edible oil, and salt have risen by 12 per cent
to 20 per cent, and the prices of some vegetables have doubled. The cost of
pulses has more than doubled, and the price of arhar (tur) dal is now Rs 100
a kilo. Sugar at Rs 30 a kilo is the consumer's bitter lot. The widespread
distress caused by high prices will be intensified by the scourge of
drought, which has hit crores of rural families in at least 246 districts
(as on 20th August 2009) in India. India has more food-deprived and
malnourished people than any other country in the world, and is ranked 66
out of 88 countries with respect to the World Hunger Index compiled by a
United Nations organization. The current rise in food prices, which puts
food out of the reach of a vast majority of the people particularly poor
women and children, serves to worsen the situation.
This Convention for the Right to Food and against Price Rise
Holds
The policies of the Central Government responsible for the price rise.
These policies include
-
the pre-budget hike in the prices of petrol by Rs 4 a litre and diesel by
Rs 2 a litre;
-
the refusal to ban futures trade in essential commodities, leading to
speculation (reflected in the high increase in the transaction in futures
trade) and higher prices;
-
weakening the public distribution system and making cuts of up to 73 per
cent in allocations of food grain for APL sections to the States in the last
two years;
-
granting, under pressure from sugar lobbies, permission to export sugar,
thus causing shortages and high prices;
-
failing to ensure – by means of public investment in infrastructure, the
provision of affordable credit, inputs and extension services, and
remunerative support prices to farmers – self-sufficiency in the production
of a range of crops, including cereals, sugarcane, pulses and oil seeds,
thus causing shortages, high prices and dependence on imports.
Reiterates
The need for a change in these policies
Emphasizes
The urgency for a food security legislation that will meet the globally
accepted definition of food security for a household, which is: "access by
all members at all times to enough food for an active, healthy life." Such
legislation must be brought without delay.
That food security cannot be linked to faulty poverty estimates made from
time to time by the Planning Commission but must be recognised as a
universal right. When the National Commission for Enterprises in the
Unorganised Sector has estimated from NSS data that 77 per cent of India's
population spends less than 20 rupees a day, anything short of recognition
of the right to food as a universal right and terminating the targeted PDS,
which has excluded large sections of the poor from the public distribution
system, is gross injustice.
This Convention for the Right to Food and against Price Rise
Considers inadequate and ill-conceived
The Government proposal for legislation as elaborated in a note circulated
to all State Governments,
and *opposes the specific proposals to*:
(1) limit food security benefits to those whom the Planning Commission
declares to be "below the poverty line," an aggregate that represents
massive statistical underestimation. Under this proposal, all rights to
decide poverty estimates are to be vested in the Central Government, even
though State Government estimates of below-poverty-line households, which
total around 11.5 crore households, are more than 40 per cent higher than
those of the Central Government. In other words, large sections of the poor
will be legally excluded from the right to food.
(2) cut down family quotas from 35 kg to 25 kg.
(3) get rid of the Antyodaya scheme, thus depriving the poorest of the poor
of the benefits they receive today. Consequently, the price at which rice is
sold to Antyodaya families will be raised from Rs 2 a kilo to Rs 3 a kilo,
and the amount of rice they receive under the scheme reduced by 10 kilos a
month.
(4) eliminate all subsidies and access to the public distribution system
for all APL households, which means that any person earning more than a
meagre Rs 11.80 a day in rural areas and Rs. 17.80 a day in urban areas will
be out of the Public Distribution System and will be left to the mercy of
the market and uncontrolled prices.
(5) restrict the legal entitlement to rice and wheat and exclude other
essential commodities such as sugar, pulses, edible oil, and kerosene. Many
States, for example, Kerala, have made other essential commodities available
at subsidised rates.
This Convention for the Right to Food and against Price Rise
Asserts
That such legislation as has been proposed will lead not to food security,
but to food *in*security. Indeed, it has been estimated that cuts in the
present allocations as proposed by the Central Government will lead to a
saving of at least Rs 4,000 crore. India still proposes to spend only 1.18
per cent of its GDP – budgeted at Rs. 52,489 crore in 2009-10 – on crucial
food subsidies, a share that is less than in many other countries of the
world. Financial constraints can never be an excuse to curtail the right to
food, and even less so when the Government is prepared to forgo taxes worth
Rs 4 lakh crore rupees in a single year, as in the 2009-2010 budget, by
means of concessions to corporates. According to one estimate, concessions
to corporates in the last two years have amounted to Rs 700 crore a day! The
annual amount of tax foregone is many times more than the cost of a
universal public distribution system.
Regrets
That the Government has not sufficiently included the rights and concerns
of farmers in the proposed food security legislation. On the contrary,
instead of policy measures geared to increase food grain production and
procurement, including the production and procurement of cereals such as
ragi, jowar, bajra, and their distribution through the PDS where such grains
are the preferred choice of consumers, the Government note speaks of the
necessity of imports to meet domestic requirements. In the context of recent
experience, when the UPA Government paid more for imported wheat than it was
prepared to give as MSP to Indian farmers, it is essential that any food
security legislation ensure expanded public procurement and fair prices to
Indian farmers for a variety of crops, including wheat, rice, millets,
pulses, oilseeds, and sugarcane. It is equally important to step up public
spending for the development of rural infrastructure, and extension services
and to ensure the availability of inputs at controlled prices.
That the Government has not taken into account the necessity to strengthen
the public distribution system, which is essential to ensure food security.
On the contrary, targeting and lower allocations have made 5 lakh fair price
shops unviable. Measures must be taken to strengthen as well as streamline
the PDS, to root out corruption and make the system more accountable to the
needs of the people by means of monitoring and vigilance committees.
That the Government has not included other food schemes such as mid-day
meal scheme and ICDS nutrition programme in the proposed legislation
*This Convention puts forward three sets of demands related to food
security:*
*Demands against Price Rise:*
-
*Ban all future trade in essential commodities*
-
*Strengthen the public distribution system. Restore allocations to the
States which were slashed for APL sections*
-
*Ensure dehoarding and take strong action against hoarders and black
marketeers*
-
*Withdraw the price hikes in petrol and diesel*
In Drought-Affected Areas
-
*Ensure distribution of food grain to all affected families in drought
hit areas on an emergency basis *
-
*Help State Governments through urgent allocation of resources to start
widescale NREGA projects to ensure real incomes of at least rupees one
hundred per work day in drought areas. Remove ceiling of 100 days and give
work on demand. Where required food grain can also be used as part payment
along with cash*
-
*Ensure regular supply of drinking water*
-
*Ensure fodder for cattle*
Demands for Food Security legislation
-
*Scrap targeting, make PDS universal; entitlements under this Act must be
delinked from Central poverty estimates*
-
*35 kg of food grain at Rs 2 per kg per nuclear household to be provided
by Central Government*
-
*include** other items, such as pulses, sugar, **cooking oil** and
kerosene, at subsidized rates in the legal guarantee *
-
*incorporate** all food and nutrition schemes of the Central Government
such as the mid-day meal scheme and ICDS nutrition programme in the proposed
legislation*
-
*promote** national self-sufficiency in production of food grain, pulses,
sugarcane, and oilseeds through public investment, provision of extension
services and appropriate land use policies with guaranteed fair prices for
farmers and expanded public procurement, **implement land reforms** *
-
*strengthen **the public distribution system of fair price shops
and **ensure
**accountability *
*This Convention calls for a nationwide struggle on the above demands.* *The
struggles should aim to force a change of policy and bring some relief to
the people.*
Control Price Rise! Ensure Food Security for All!
_______________________________________________
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