Livestock schemes to be merged

Context:

The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) decided that the Central government will spend ₹9,800 crore on livestock development over the next five years in a bid to leverage almost ₹55,000 crore of outside investment into the sector.

Relevance:

GS-III: Agriculture (Agriculture and allied industries, Economics of Animal-Rearing)

Dimensions of the Article:

1. Role of Livestock in Indian Economy
2. About the recent CCEA decision

Role of Livestock in Indian Economy

• Livestock plays an important role in Indian economy as more than 20 million people depend upon livestock for their livelihood. Livestock provides livelihood to two-third of rural community.
• It also provides employment to about 8.8 % of the population in India.
• Livestock contributed 16% to the income of small farm households as against an average of 14% for all rural households.
• Livestock sector contributes to more than 4% of our GDP and more than 25% of total Agriculture GDP.

Based on the 20th Livestock Census:

• India is World’s highest livestock owner at more than 530 million.
• India ranks First in the total buffalo population in the world at more than 100 million buffaloes.
• India also ranks Second in the population of goats and houses the Second largest poultry market in the world.
• India is the Second largest producer of fish and also second largest aquaculture nation in the world.

About the recent CCEA decision

• To boost growth in the livestock sector and thereby making animal husbandry more remunerative to 10 crore farmers engaged in Animal Husbandry Sector the CCEA has approved implementation of a special livestock sector package.
• The package has been designed by revising and realigning various components of the Department of Animal Husbandry & Dairying’ Schemes for the next five years, starting 2021-22.
• All the schemes of the Department will be merged into three broad categories as:
  1. Development Programmes: It includes Rashtriya Gokul Mission, National Programme for Dairy Development (NPDD), National Livestock Mission (NLM) and Livestock Census and Integrated Sample Survey (LC & ISS) as sub-schemes.
  2. Disease Control Programme: It is renamed as Livestock Health and Disease Control (LH & DC) which includes the present Livestock Health and Disease Control (LH & DC) scheme and National Animal Disease Control Programme (NADCP).
  3. Infrastructure Development Fund: The Animal Husbandry Infrastructure Development fund (AHIDF) and the Dairy Infrastructure Development Fund (DIDF) are merged and the present scheme for support to Dairy Cooperatives and Farmer Producer Organizations engaged in Dairy activities is also included in this third category.

-Source: The Hindu