Everyone is teary eyed — the peelers and the dealers; even more the Congress. The only ones who see the onion price rise as a sign of hope are the BJP; after all, they know what onions can do in politics. The last time onion prices shot up, the then ruling BJP government was shot down by the voters in Delhi and Rajasthan. It is said that it was the onion prices that brought down the Janata Party in the late 1970s.

More over, with drastic price increase of the other staple veggie of India — garlic — the BJP suddenly seems to feel it has a chance to be a ruling party. This may be good for BJP but what about the people?

In Karnataka, we get most of our onion supplies from Dharwad, Gadag and Bijapur. But the unrelenting rains have reduced onion production by nearly 50%, according to reports from the Agricultural Produce Marketing Corporation (APMC) yard there. Now that exports are suspended, the prices have reportedly begun to see a drop.

But that is because the local farmers are in “panic – selling” mode fearing that the export onions which are bigger and better in quality, will enter the local market and reduce the price of their produce.

In recent times, the vegetable prices have been on the rise. With India’s population rising without any signs of slowing, it is time for the government to put in place a new agenda for agriculture.

It is said the future industry is agriculture. The world population is increasing and the amount of cultivable land decreasing. To add, the number of farmers is on the decline while the new developing countries are consuming more food. It is inevitable that in the future there will be too many mouths to feed and food will get costlier. Our planet currently supports 6.5 billion people and by 2050, it is projected to be well over 9 billion. In 1950, there was 1.23 acres of arable land per person in the world but now we have dropped to 0.49 acres, just about half – an - acre per person.

We in India will be the most populated nation in the world and so our government has to find a way of keeping food cost down and increase production. Yes, we succeeded in becoming self - reliant when it came to feeding our people with the “Green revolution” headed by Dr. M. S. Swaminathan in the early 1960s but looks like the time has come again for another food revolution. It is time to professionalise agriculture in India and somehow bring it into the organised sector. It is time to make sure our agricultural productivity is always on the upward trend while using the most sustainable model of production.

Agriculture does not have to be a burden on the exchequer with all the subsidies because it is being touted as the next big business.
In fact, many nations are buying up cultivable land throughout the world; especially in Africa. Middle-eastern nations like Qatar and Saudi Arabia have bought millions of hectares of land in Africa. According to International Food Policy Research Institute, India too has purchased huge tracts of land in Africa.

So while the government buys land in Africa, it must also encourage the Indian farmers and facilitate the new trend of successful and intelligent urban class who are turning to farming.

Modern farming is viable and the government has to help the city - dweller realise it. It is also time to put an end to our government’s bad habit of randomly acquiring fertile lands for industrial purposes and then allotting it to non - industrialists and industrialists who never intend to put up an industry. Also the Central Government must put an end to the “notification and de-notification” racket run by every government.

More importantly, it is a good time to go back to our granny's ways when kitchen gardens were as important as the puja room.

Many may remember that even if one lived in a small house there was always enough space to grow a little beans, a few tomatoes and the must - have “kothambari soppu” (coriander leaves). If the house had a little space in front, then there would be a sapota tree in the corner and a guava tree in the back with the easy growing papaya and of course, there was always place for a coconut tree.

Today we are so busy that let alone buying fresh vegetables from the market, we buy packed and frozen vegetables stored deep in the freezer of a supermarket.

May be it’s time to get back a little to the old ways and start enjoying a little time tending to a real kitchen garden instead of playing gardening game on Facebook.