Disclaimer: This article is an output of correlating few data / information what we have today and should be considered as one of the inputs for future planning. The author is not an expert and has expressed his opinion from his understanding.
The key point i am trying to make in this article is that India's much acclaimed green revolution which was poorly planned is the root cause of high % of diabetes and malnutrition in the country. While we have to give due credit for the progress we have made with Green revolution but better planning over a period of time could have avoided the situation we are in today. I certainly concede that "In hindsight everyone is wiser".
To prove my point I am going to present multiple facts and data points and draw a correlation from them.
1. Malnutrition in India:
This alarming state of affairs is reproduced from Wikipedia...
"The World Bank estimates that India is ranked 2nd in the world of the number of children suffering from malnutrition, after Bangladesh (in 1998), where 47% of the children exhibit a degree of malnutrition. The prevalence of underweight children in India is among the highest in the world, and is nearly double that of Sub-Saharan Africa with dire consequences for mobility, mortality, productivity and economic growth. The UN estimates that 2.1 million Indian children die before reaching the age of 5 every year – four every minute....
The 2011 Global Hunger Index (GHI) Report ranked India 15th, amongst leading countries with hunger situation. It also places India amongst the three countries where the GHI between 1996 and 2011 went up from 22.9 to 23.7, while 78 out of the 81 developing countries studied, including Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh, Vietnam, Kenya, Nigeria, Myanmar, Uganda, Zimbabwe and Malawi, succeeded in improving hunger condition..."
Only in 3 out of 81 countries GHI index has worsened and India is one among them. There are multiple problems which range from political, bureaucratic, agricultural productivity, water and resource management etc. But one thing is clear that despite huge gains in agricultural output we still are not able prevent a significant size of our population starving every day.
2. Diabetes Capital of the world:
With 63 million+ estimated Diabetes patients India is closing in on China which has the highest Diabetes population of 93 million fighting for the title "Diabetes capital of the world". I request you to read the article here on the Diabetes problem in India. http://www.suryaecolife.blogspot.in/2013/04/millets-vs-diabetes-obesity-and.html
3. Green revolution in India:
Again quoting from Wiki...
"The introduction of high-yielding varieties of seeds and the increased use of fertilizers and irrigation are known collectively as the Green Revolution, which provided the increase in production needed to make India self-sufficient in food grains, thus improving agriculture in India. high-yielding wheat was first introduced to India in 1963. M.S. Swaminathan is known as the "Father of the Green Revolution in India" The methods adopted included the use of high yielding varieties(HYV) of seeds.."
Green revolution promoted the development of Rice and Wheat in India which resulted in extremely good growth over the years and has helped self sufficiency for India in terms of food grains. All kudos to the team which has worked towards it. There is absolutely no belittling their efforts.
But let me continue in the next article where the planning over the period of years could have been better...
Article by Rags Gopalan...
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