We depend on farmers every day, but appreciation rarely pays for a failed crop, a broken pump or a delayed payment. If we want more people to see a future in agriculture, we must ask what would make that future secure enough to choose.

The idea that “more farmers means a healthier nation” expresses respect for the people who grow our food. I would refine it: a healthier nation makes farming a dignified, viable livelihood, while giving rural families real choices. Counting farmers is not the same as measuring their wellbeing.

Measure the quality of the livelihood

A household can work extremely hard on a farm and still have little left after paying for seed, fertiliser, labour, rent, energy, transport and borrowing. A larger harvest is not automatically a larger profit. Nor does having more family members depend on the same small holding necessarily improve anyone’s income.

Judge agricultural progress through stable net earnings, manageable risk, nutrition, debt stress, working conditions and the health of land and water. Include the value of unpaid family labour when examining the economics. Without that, an apparently profitable activity may depend on people working for almost nothing.

Encouraging farming should mean making it attractive to willing entrants and sustainable for existing farmers. A young person choosing engineering, healthcare or a village enterprise is not betraying agriculture. Rural prosperity can include strong farms and good jobs outside farming.

Promise a dependable service, not just a new structure

My first priority would be a village-level assessment of water reliability. Which farms depend entirely on rain? Which receive canal water too late? Which tanks have damaged inlets or blocked drainage? Publish the findings and rank repairs alongside new works.

New channels can help where technically and legally feasible, but their budgets should include operation, maintenance and fair distribution. Tell farmers the likely seasonal supply before they commit to a crop. Keep a practical fallback plan for dry years instead of encouraging cultivation on the strength of an inauguration speech.

Rain-fed areas deserve equal attention through locally suitable soil-moisture measures, crop choices and advice. More irrigation everywhere is not a realistic universal promise. The right support depends on the farm’s actual conditions.

Give farmers advice they can use and question

ICAR describes Krishi Vigyan Kendras as district-level institutions for technology assessment, demonstrations, training and farm advice. India therefore has an existing extension foundation; the task is to make useful assistance consistently accessible, not pretend that farmer education has never existed.

A practical service standard could offer regular village visits, local-language demonstrations and a way to get follow-up answers. Show the cost as well as the possible yield benefit of a practice. Explain conditions in which it may fail. Advice should help farmers compare options, including the option not to purchase another input.

Farmers should help identify the problems that demonstrations address. Their observations about soils, weather and local markets are part of the evidence. Training works better as an exchange that tests ideas than as a lecture implying that experience has no value.

Knowledge includes managing shared resources

A CLARE programme account of work in Karnataka describes community hydrology training and its integration with Farmer Water Schools. It offers a relevant example of water literacy connecting local observation with decisions about supply, demand and crop choice. The programme’s account should not be treated as independent proof of improved incomes in every village.

My recommendation is to link such learning to practical records: rainfall, tank levels, pumping hours and seasonal supply. Discuss those records before planting decisions. Publish assumptions openly so a forecast is not mistaken for a guarantee.

Women cultivators, tenant farmers and people at the end of irrigation systems must be able to participate. A meeting attended only by prominent landowners is an incomplete picture of a village’s needs.

Production support must meet a workable market

Helping everyone grow more of the same perishable crop without checking demand can move the problem from the field to the market. A district plan should connect production advice with likely buyers, quality requirements, transport and realistic storage options.

Useful public investments may include reliable weighing, grading facilities, collection points and access to several buyers. Where cold storage is proposed, publish energy costs, utilisation assumptions and the produce it can actually handle. An expensive building with unaffordable charges is not a service.

Support farmer organisations where they can improve bargaining or shared services, while requiring transparent accounts and member control. Show payment terms clearly and provide a credible dispute route. No institution should be presented as a guaranteed cure for low prices.

Make support usable when something goes wrong

Input quality, borrowing terms, weather shocks and late payments can all affect a household’s ability to continue. Support should therefore include accessible information about applicable credit and insurance options, independent explanation of exclusions, and help following a complaint or claim.

Eligibility and benefits differ across schemes and circumstances; this proposal does not promise universal cover or automatic compensation. The service goal is simpler: a farmer should know where to apply, what evidence is needed, who will decide and how to challenge a delay.

Dependable healthcare, schooling, roads, electricity and communications also matter. Families deciding whether to remain in a village are choosing a life, not only an occupation. Agricultural policy should coordinate with those services instead of treating them as somebody else’s problem.

Publish a village farming-service scorecard

  • Water: scheduled deliveries achieved, failed outlets and repair times.
  • Advice: visits completed, questions resolved and farmer assessment of usefulness.
  • Markets: access to buyers, payment delays and functioning shared facilities.
  • Inclusion: whether smallholders, tenants and women can actually use the support.
  • Outcomes: changes in costs, net returns and resilience, with the survey method and limitations disclosed.

Publish aggregate results without exposing a household’s private finances. Explain weather and price changes when comparing years; a favourable season should not automatically be claimed as proof of a programme’s success. Independent sample checks would help test the numbers.

Respect should be visible in everyday conditions

More people may choose farming if its returns, risks and living conditions improve. Some may combine it with another occupation. Others may choose a different career while remaining part of a thriving rural economy. All can be reasonable outcomes.

The national goal should be farms that can feed people while sustaining the people who work on them. Reliable facilities, honest advice, functioning markets and accountable services make that goal more concrete than praise alone.