The government need to fundamentally reform labour markets to attract people to cities and create economic opportunities in rural India. Discuss (200 Words)
Refer - The Indian Express
Enrich the answer from other sources, if the question demands.
IAS Parliament 4 years
KEY POINTS
· Over 85 per cent of employment in India is in the informal sector. An unplanned national lockdown halted economic activity and wiped out livelihoods, especially of informal workers.
· The Centre for Monitoring the Indian Economy (CMIE) estimates that between mid-March and mid-April, 120 million people lost their jobs, with unemployment rising to an all-time high of 27 per cent. Left with nothing, we saw reverse migration on an unprecedented scale — some 10 million people abandoned cities to return to their native villages. For a while, our media was full of discussion of the need to address some of our most chronic social problems.
· Labour regulation must start with a clear-eyed recognition of facts: We have stringent labour laws to protect workers, but this covers only the formal sector — under 15 per cent of employment.
· Living conditions in our cities is the second challenge. For too long, we have been content to drive by slums where some of the people who clean our homes, deliver our goods, and repair our equipment live in squalor.
· Reverse migration is also an opportunity to collaborate in spreading the geography of development. We have long had policies aimed at getting firms to invest in less-developed districts and the current government has an ambitious goal of doubling farmer’s incomes.
· But the gap between the richest (urban) and poorest (rural) districts in the country still keeps growing. We need a three-pronged approach: First, the easiest way to grow farmer incomes is by having them grow more value-added crops.
· Fruits and vegetables have great export potential, and exports must be consistently encouraged and not switched on and off as domestic prices change. And the cultivation of palm plantations has the potential for huge import substitution, we need corporate farming as the gestation period of seven years for the first crop is too much for the average farmer to handle.
· We need to encourage agro-processing near the source. Fostering entrepreneurship in rural and semi-urban areas would combine nicely with local processing. And third, we need to invest even more massively in rural connectivity. Today, we would add digital connectivity to road connectivity to level the playing field for all regardless of where they live.
K. V. A 4 years
Pls review
IAS Parliament 4 years
Good attempt. Keep Writing.
Shivangi 4 years
Please review . Thank you.
IAS Parliament 4 years
Good attempt. Keep Writing.
