Apropos of the column ?Dousing the veggie fire? (FE, September 9), Ashok Gulati has rightly pointed out the need to de-list fruit and vegetables from the APMC Act nationwide as this could augment the process of directly sourcing from the small farmers and getting it ready for direct retailing. Circumventing the mandi operators will reduce the price the consumers pay and the prices the realised by farmers will also go up. Kudos to the Delhi government for de-listing of fruit and vegetables from the APMC Act. Could the other states join the stream of de-listing the costly food items, please? Creating kisan mandis will facilitate direct marketing of vegetables and fruit?such mandis have to be popularised with support from the government to keep them viable. Concurrently, the government must review its farm subsidies policy and go for a per acre subsidy instead of offering largesse for certain crops out of the public coffers. Setting a common policy on fruit and vegetable cultivation and retails is the need of the hour. There has to be some kind of thinking on the current state of food inflation. To bring down protein prices, livestock must be bolstered as a recent study has found that the number of these animals is falling.
Nagarajan Ramaswamy
via e-mail
Foreign investment in India
Apropos of the column ?Love in Tokyo? (FE, September 4), short of land, Japan had been the most adventurous of nations setting up shop in foreign shores. Japan?s net outward flows last year are an indication of its potential to invest. The lack of any headline announcement during Modi?s visit underscores the weak pull India has for external investors. This gap needs to be bridged by the Indian government. From labour law reforms to repealing retrospective taxation, many moves have to be made before international investment makes India a preferred destination.
R Narayanan, Ghaziabad
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