Farmers were hoping for an immediate relief from govt: EPC Ind

Although the Union Budget 2016 announced to double its spending on agriculture and farmers welfare, Ashok Sharma, ED, EPC Industrie says the measures will not give an immediate relief to farmers and could be beneficial only in the medium to long-term. The farmers were expecting an immediate relief from the government.

In an eye-catching announcement, the Budget doubled spending on agriculture and farmers' welfare to USD 5.3 billion in support of the promise that their incomes would double by 2022.

However, for the company per se the outlays from the Budget will be positive. EPC is an micro irrigation company which has been working closely with the farmers, says Sharma.

According to him if disbursements from the states are more efficient it will help the industry.Below is the verbatim transcript of Ashok Sharma's interview with Latha Venkatesh & Nigel D'Souza on CNBC-TV18. Nigel: What is your reading of the Budget allocations for the agricultural sector on the whole? What factors in the Budget standout for you as well as for your business? A: I will talk about the impact of the Budget on the agriculture sector. There have been some good announcements in terms of overall outlay in the agri plan vis-à-vis irrigation vis-à-vis support to the farmers for interest for building the overall infrastructure in terms of higher allocation of Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA). So there have been good proposals on the overall agri space but the way I look at it, these announcements and these allocations would impact more on the medium and long-term. Today, the challenge for Indian agriculture after two consecutive years of drought is the farmers and we were expecting immediate relief, so that the farmers are able to deal with the current crisis which has not come out clearly in the announcements. So that's where we expect that in the medium to long-term things will be good for the agri space but in the next six months to one year, it may not impact so significantly as is expected by the farmers and by the industry. Latha: What do these allocations in the Budget mean to your business? A: EPC Industrie is one of the leading micro irrigation company in the country and we are directly impacted by the increased allocation in this Budget, so to that extent it will be positive for the industry. EPC has been working closely with farmers in terms of disseminating agronomy knowledge and advanced farming technologies so that the farmers can benefit. So from that perspective it is definitely good for the industry and for EPC. However, I would like to repeat that the disbursement from the states needs to become much more efficient, so that the farmer actually gets the benefit of increased subsidy.