The impact of new agricultural export policy on Indian agriculture exports

• Published date: 01 November 2020
• Author: Parashram Patil,Pravin Jadhav,Moinak Maiti
• Date: 01 November 2020
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/pa.2303

PRACTITIONER PAPER

The impact of new agricultural export policy on Indian

agriculture exports

Parashram Patil

1

|Pravin Jadhav

2

|Moinak Maiti

3

1

Department of Agricultural and Processed

Food Products Export Development Authority

(APEDA), Ministry of Commerce, Government

of India, New Delhi, India

2

Department of Economics, Institute of

Infrastructure Technology Research and

Management (IITRAM), Ahmedabad, India

3

National Research University Higher School

of Economics, St. Petersburg School of

Economics and Management, Department for

Finance, Kantemirovskaya, Sankt Petersburg,

Russia

Correspondence

Moinak Maiti, National Research University

Higher School of Economics, St. Petersburg

School of Economics and Management,

Department for Finance, Kantemirovskaya,

Sankt Petersburg, Russia.

Email: mmaiti@hse.ru

The main objective of this study is to evaluate the impact of new agricultural export

policy implemented by the government of India in 2018. Firstly, this paper critically

evaluates the different programs undertaken by the Ministry of Commerce under

Agricultural Export Policy, 2018 to doubling farmers income by 2022. Further, this

article evaluates the impact of new agricultural export policy on enhancing the pro-

ductivity and profitability on Indian Agriculture. Overall results of the article suggest

that new agriculture export policy will set the foundation to make Indian agriculture

globally competitive. Ease of doing agricultural business index will encourage health

competition between the states. Transport and marketing assistance scheme will help

Indian agricultural exporters to more competitive in global market and mitigates the

hindrance of a higher cost of transportation. Agricultural Export Cluster will enhance

the involvement of small and marginal farmers in the export bracket. Finally, this arti-

cle discussed that productivity of Indian Agriculture is lower but with the help of new

agricultural policy India could enhance the productivity of most of the agriculture

goods in India.

1|INTRODUCTION

The agriculture sector (Maiti, 2018a; Maiti, 2018b) is one of the most

important sectors of the Indian economy. The agriculture sector is

contributing around 50% in the total workforce in India and its contri-

bution to the GDP is around 15%.87 in 2018–2019. India is becoming

an emerging economic power and, in this transition, the agriculture

sector has to contribute a lot (Maiti & Kayal, 2017). Recently,

Narendra Modi-led NDA Government approved independent India's

first comprehensive “Agriculture Export Policy”intending to double

farmers' income as well as the share of agriculture exports from the

current USD 30 billion to USD 60 billion by 2022 (Ministry of Com-

merce and Industry, Agricultural Export Policy, 2018). Though the tar-

get looks ambitious given the present distress in the farming

community, it has been considered as a welcome step towards making

the farming a profitable economic activity. The main objective of the

policy is to engage farmers in modern trade and commerce-related

activities and thereby increase their income significantly. The policy

also aims at increasing domestic production and explores ways and

means to enhance domestic trade linkages with global markets

(Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Agricultural Export

Policy, 2018). As the policy seeks to address the infrastructure gaps

within the agriculture ecosystem, it is expected to give much-needed

relief not only to the farming community but also to the rural econ-

omy as a whole. The policy also seeks to promote research and devel-

opment for quality products, encourage diversification of products

and markets, facilitate the development of value-added products,

develop agribusiness, and encourage the involvement of local farmers

in the agriculture development process.

2|REVIEW OF LITERATURE

The past studies with regard to agriculture polices have the primary

goal of ensuring food security, and agro-trade policies support to this

goal (Hoda & Gulati, 2013). Utilization of irrigation, regenerating

groundwater, water harvesting, and drip irrigations, nutrient-based

fertilizer subsidy, agro credit through institutional sources, only keep-

ing strategic reserves of food grain stock, and levying an export duty

rather than imposing quantitative restriction and so forth are

Received: 8 April 2020Revised: 23 April 2020Accepted: 17 July 2020

DOI: 10.1002/pa.2303

J Public Affairs. 2020;20:e2303.wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/pa© 2020 John Wiley & Sons Ltd1of6

https://doi.org/10.1002/pa.2303