Hold talks with farmers' representatives, PM Narendra Modi told

Hyderabad: Amidst the ongoing farmer protests against the new agricultural sector laws, farmers' activist and chief advisor of Consortium of Indian Farmers Association P Chengal Reddy has urged Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar to hold discussions with farmers across the country, before taking further decisions.

Reddy said that reforms are essential, because "our productivity is low, the processing is low, value realisation is low and we have a lot of rain-fed farming. Since the 1990 reforms, the industry and service sector is growing around 10 per cent. But, agriculture exceeded one or 2 per cent, because there are no technologies and mostly you need investments."

"Today, except for pulses and oilseeds we have huge stocks of rice, wheat, vegetables, fruits, and spices. We are not able to do any value addition to export them, the reason is no marketing," he added.

Reddy said that farmers from different states have different opinions on the new agricultural laws."We want Modi and Tomar to consult us also, farmers from different States and regions have different opinions.

They cannot have talks with only one set of people protesting from Punjab. The State government must not interfere in the process and use its machinery to participate in resolving the farmers' issues.