Centre for Agricultural and Food Security Policies and Research (CAFSPR)

Rights of agriculturists and food security are two major concerns in the era of rapid industrialization. India has an agriculture based economy and there are many issues in the domain of agriculture and food security that require policy-makers’ attention. Today, more than 800 million people across the globe go to bed hungry every night, most of them smallholder farmers who depend on agriculture to make a living and feed their families. Investing in smallholder farmers many of whom are women and in the markets around them is more important than ever. In case of India, research on agrarian distress has proliferated and most studies agree that a combination of policy-induced, technological and ecological factors is responsible for India’s agrarian crisis. Public investment in agriculture has declined steadily and policy approach towards the sector has been piecemeal. India’s long-term food security concerns must feature more prominently in the policy discourse. This focus of CAFSPR is to initiate extensive deliberations and systematic research in order to shape policy decisions and come up with pragmatic solutions to the problems of agriculture and food security with due consultation with stakeholders.