Thursday 15 October 2015

WHY ARE WE PAYING SO MUCH FOR FOOD?



I may not be an expert in understanding the nuances of food economics, but I am infinitely better informed than the self proclaimed agro-economists who aimlessly discuss on television, the rising prices of onion and pulses, as the season may be, and invariably take a stand that best suits their political masters. I say so because in the journey your food takes from the farm to the plate I am present at both the ends. As a small time farmer I am struggling to keep my farmland economically viable and as a food consumer I am feeling the burning hole in my pocket! It is very much akin to being squeezed in a vice, and I shudder to think what would have been my plight if farming was my first profession.

It was onions a few months back, and it is pulses now, why do we have these cruel spikes in their prices? Our farmlands are shrinking and we have not yet made up our mind about genetically modified food. The last green revolution and white revolution occurred decades ago. Since then what substantial have our agricultural scientists done? Our doctors have got rid of polio, our space researchers have sent a mission to Mars, our Defense scientists have created indigenous missiles and nuclear devices, but what have we achieved in the field of agriculture of late? Who are the new Swaminathans and Kurians?

India is experiencing high rate of economic growth in the last two decades but the growth has been coupled with high rate of food price inflation. The growth has been very uneven across sectors with agriculture remaining very sluggish. The increase in per capita income has significantly increased the demand for food but agricultural production has failed to keep pace with the growing demand. Like the price of any other commodity, agricultural price is also a market outcome and demand and supply in the market play an important role in the determination of price. The market imperfections can create distortion in the functioning of the market and influence price by controlling supply.

 A typical agricultural marketing channel ‘from farm to plate’ is: Farmer – Local assembler – Central wholesaler – Retailer – Consumer. The retail prices are determined nearly in a perfectly competitive market situation. However, a few traders dominate in the wholesale market both as buyers and sellers. They act as the bottleneck of the marketing process. Vegetables are perishable and cannot be hoarded infinitely, but pulses can be very easily. But even these market imperfections can influence the price temporarily but it cannot sustain price rise for a long period if there is no actual shortage. There may be seasonal variation also in the prices of agricultural commodities. Prices are low in harvest season and high in lean season. No doubt malicious elements are in play sometimes, but such a sustained and long term price rise is not caused by corruption.

The demand for food items is increasing at a very high rate following a steady increase in per capita income. Higher disposable income has also changed the pattern of consumption. the pressure on prices is more on protein foods like pulses, milk and milk products, egg, fish and meat and vegetables indicating the shift in consumption pattern from cereal based diets to protein based diets due to rise in income. Naturally, there has been a mismatch between the growing demand and the actual production.

So why is there a slump in agricultural production? India lacks 3 major resources to sustain its population – Hydrocarbons (Oil / gas), Water and   Land, and guess what these are the three resources that are most crucial for sustenance of agriculture! Manufacturing, energy and service industry are competing with agriculture for land, water and human resources which has driven up the price for all of them. Price for agricultural land and labor has gone up leading to increased opportunity costs of agriculture.

The problems which agricultural sector is facing today are:
A. The rising cost of cultivation: Even with his own land the cost of cultivating paddy and wheat have gone up by 15 to 20% and this is across the board – seeds, water, manure, farm labour, diesel, farm equipments and gadgets and electricity.
B. Concentration of power in Mandis: Farmers can mostly sell their produce only to registered traders in primary mandis, which are governed by the Agricultural Produce Marketing Committee Act — a model law whose jurisdiction lies with individual states. Most crops are grown in a few states and then dispatched countrywide. In each of these states, a handful of mandis handle most of the trade and set reference prices. In onions, for instance, most of the surplus comes from Maharashtra and Karnataka. And the reference mandis in Maharashtra are Lasalgaon and Pimpalgaon. Local political bigwigs control these mandis and generate their party fund from them.
C. Trading of food grains: the depreciation in the rupee makes imported fertilizer more expensive and also makes exports more attractive. In the last three years, agro exports, notably non-basmati rice and wheat, are up.
D. Speculator trading of commodities and market regulations: Speculators in commodities trading are jacking up prices by hoarding vegetables specially onions! A law to remove the monopoly of local hoarders and cartels who never allow farmers to sell their produce to the market directly is being implemented in some states now.
E. Transport and distribution: Nothing is more disheartening than seeing stocks of wheat rot in the open in the railway yards of Punjab, when people in rural Orissa and Andhra are starving to death. According to various reports on climate change, the country is expected to face more frequent floods and droughts in the future. This will increase the occurrence of supply shocks.

To contain the prices of potatoes and onions (which together account for 39% of the vegetables produced in India), the government maintains a price stabilization fund which will be used to support govt. interventions in market for managing prices. Prices of all other vegetables are likely to follow the demand and supply mechanisms prevalent in local markets.

Agriculture requires a huge investment package from the government and F.D.Is can help. They will bring about an overall diversification of the agriculture sector and encourage research and this will have a big impact. With our historic bias towards the cereals sector unfortunately sectors such as vegetables, livestock or horticulture and fisheries have not got enough support from the government policies. We are yet to see the big wave of growth within these sectors.  Food packaging, food storage, food transportation, maintaining cold chains are areas where F.D.I will be truly beneficial. With more food available everywhere the prices will fall.

Monday 12 October 2015

THESE DEGREES ARE NOT GOOD ENOUGH!

I was in Germany, attending a Plastic Surgery meeting, where I met an old friend of mine and we talked amongst other things, about our families. Her daughter had recently married and when I asked what the groom did for living, she informed me that he was a motor mechanic and was doing very well in life! “We repair the car owners and he repairs the cars” was what she said proudly. Contrast this with what your response would have been – he is MD in Radiodiagnosis and working in a 5 star hospital or an MBA and working with a multinational firm, or a PG from a reputed school of Economics and in working the Planning Commission. My friend did not even bother to mention her son in law’s academic qualifications, because according her, and according to most of the developed world, the university degrees are just a vehicle to achieve greater working skills in life. But, are our Universities and colleges providing these skills when they are handing over the gold embossed and exquisitely calligraphic graduate degrees? Are these degree holders market ready? Are they employable? If not, then what good is being served by these degrees and this education? And above all, is there any relation what so ever between these degrees and education?

In India, people are obsessed with attaining a graduation degree and generally look down upon vocational education. This has resulted in a situation where on the one hand there are tens of thousands of unemployed graduates and on the other hand there is a huge shortage of skilled workers such as teachers, interpreters, plumbers, carpenters, electricians etc. To rectify this situation vocational training programmes in India need to be promoted in a big way. The Government should stress on reforms in school education system to make it students centric, reduce stress and introduce vocational education at senior secondary stage with provision for transfer to the general university system. We should develop skilled manpower through diversified courses to meet the requirements of mainly the unorganized sector and to instill self-employment skills in people through a large number of self employment oriented courses.

Vocational education is imparted in our country through Industrial Training Institutes (ITIs) and polytechnics. One of the weaknesses of Indian education system is that it does not gives due importance to vocational education and those who pass out with Diplomas from these institutes are considered lower in the pecking order than those from the innumerable Engineering colleges, medical colleges and business schools. If we do not address this perception problem and if we do not start giving respect to skill and employability there will exist a mismatch between the skilled manpower required and skilled manpower available despite our ever growing unemployment problem. Every year we churn out millions of graduates who do not have the specific skill sets required by the market. If this trend continues it would hurt our economic growth in the long run. To change this situation first we need to change our mindset.

Last year the anaemic largest opposition party was unduly perturbed because the new Human Resource Minister did not possess that coveted graduate degree. Did the lack of that priceless piece of paper prevent her from excelling in her own sphere of life – as an actor and as a political activist? History is riddled with geniuses who never bothered about this system of education.

The list of successful people, from all spheres of life, who never had any college degree, is endless. Julie Andrews, Jennifer Anniston, Dhirubhai Ambani, Woody Allen, Andre Agassi, Gautam Adani, Bryan Adams, Warren Beatty, Boris Becker, Steffi Graf, Swami Bhaktipada, Charles Bronson, Warren Buffet, Gisele Bundchen, Heidi Klum, Christopher Columbus, Sean Connery, Brunello  Cucinelli (fashion designer), Cindy Crawford, Michael Dell (Dell Computers), Robert De Niro, Walt Disney, Bob Dylan, Albert Einstein, Queen Elizabeth II, William Faulkner, Henry Ford, Robert Frost, Bill Gates, John Glenn (Astronaut and Senator), Whoppi Goldberg,  Harper Lee (Pulitzer Prize for ‘To Kill a Mockingbird’),Adolph Hitler, John F. Kennedy, Abraham Lincoln, Dustin Hoffman, Steve Jobbs and Rabindra Nath Tagore never graduated from an University but surely they possessed unparalleled skills, and are a testament to the fact skills should be respected. These are / were people with astounding personalities, to whom the lack of a degree from an University never mattered, but what about those thousands and thousands of skilled people in our work force, who are farming in the fields, teaching in tuition classes, working in textile industry, helping the dairy industry, repairing mobile phones, colour televisions, computers, scooters and cars? Why is the society not prepared to give them the respect which they deserve? We all know how invaluable a good plumber or a good electrician or a good carpenter is. Have we ever asked them to produce their University degree before offering them the job? A degree would have perhaps made them a useless consultant, not prepared to dirty their hands!


So, at the end of the day, we should abort the distorted notions about BBA, MBA, BE, MBBS start respecting skills and stop running after these self hyper branded  and society glamorized degrees which end up in producing a sterile force of unemployable graduates. Universities are sucking money like vampires and producing these degree holders whom the market doesn’t require. Our Universities should provide many opportunities to develop new skills and further enhance our existing ones. In addition to the skills related to our subject, our course can develop skills such as communication, teamwork, time management, negotiation and problem solving through group work, presentations, written reports and research. The government has started a new stream of education called B.Voc which is Bachelor of Vocational Training and there are 80 vocations being taught all over India. I hope this is the first step towards producing employable graduates.

Colleges can impart skills in both curricular and extra-curricular activities. Skills can also be developed through activities such as obtaining work experience, volunteering, being part of a sports team, taking on a leadership role in a student society, or organizing fundraising for national calamities. Entrepreneurship needs to be encouraged at the college level and respect for the skilled, who are adding to the productivity of the Nation, rather than those degree holders who are unemployed, and worse still – unemployable, is the need of the hour. While the former are assets to the Nation, the latter are simply parasites – hungry for a job for which they are not prepared. Our education system cannot continue to produce parasites!

Saturday 10 October 2015

FROM A STREET FOOD JUNKIE

I am privileged to be staying in a city which can easily be called the street food haven. With Kabab - paratha, Biriyani, boti or gilawati kabab with rumali roti and makhan-malai and thandai, my city Lucknow is to street food, what Vatican is to the Christian faith……….unquestionably at the very pinnacle of excellence! May be that is why I am a bit biased to the concept that a city is just as good as the food that is vended in its streets for the masses and the guests alike. Free from the pretence and obsession with status that permeate so many restaurants, street food is so often the best food. It is, after all, a more authentic, honest and pure form of cooking that most truly reflects the culture of the city. Street food is ready to eat food or drink sold in street, stadiums, race courses, cinemas and other public places,

I am very upset when I see the big Indian tour groups in America, Europe or South East Asia planning a halt at an Indian restaurant for lunch or dinner. Who on earth would like to eat Idli-sambhar in London or Tanduri chicken in Johanesberg? If you are looking for tea with cream and sugar or a glass of lassi in Berlin, then where will you taste beer…..in Bhatinda? There are elements in street food that you can't acquire when playing it safe and you truly can't experience the country's culture when you limit yourself to Indian food.
Maggi Katam
With the sights and the sounds, the flora and the fauna, the dance and the culture, the food and beverage of a country one visits is a vital ingredient which completes the kaleidoscopic impression of the country. Every time I eat crabs I am reminded of Maggi-katam, a crab dish I devoured with friends when I was in Kota Bharu, Malaysia! I cannot imagine Kota Bharu without its mouth watering sea food and honey tea!

Wandering through the street food hubs in parts of the world, notably those which proliferate in south-east Asia is my passion. It is an event in itself with the sights, the smells and the energy emanating from local people plying their trade. So whether it is the food street in Lahore or the litti-chokha joints in Gorakhpur, I love them all. The night bazzar of Hua Hin in Thailand sells a papaya prawn salad, which cannot be surpassed by the classiest 5 star hotel with the most talented bunch of chefs. And what's more, it's ridiculously cheap, being invariably a fraction of the cost of what you'd pay for the same dish in a restaurant.

Oktoberfest in Munich 
For some travelers, understandable concerns over hygiene will often mean street food will never top everyone's menu overseas. But while it pays to exercise a certain degree of common sense, always playing it safe is to miss out on some of the best cuisine you'll ever try. Street food is the best way to experience the vibe of the city, a direct conduit into its heart and soul – it's action-packed, friendly and inviting and the choice is astounding.

If you are travelling in India then every city has its own speciality. Mumbai is a city of dreams and opportunity, best expressed through its vibrant food culture. Mumbai stamping grounds include the Colaba and Fort districts as well as the Kala Ghoda district and my favorite are the street vendors along Khao Galli, a popular eat street. Whether it is kheecha , a seasoned rice flour flat bread cooked over hot coals or vada pav, a bread rolhwith spicy potato filling], they are just divine! The lassi at the entrance of Dadar station, chat, bhel-puri and pani puri at Elco in Bandra or the incredible fish tikka of Pal's Fish Corner are all a part of Mumbai’s culture!

Delhi is no pushover when it comes to street food and Chandni Chaok is the Mecca of street food in this capital city. The famous parathe wali galli sells mouth watering parathas stuffed with a world of goodies. The mughlai paratha, chicken kali mirch and the mutton chap for the omnivorous and the halwa-puri for die hard vegis, nobody is left disappointed! Kolkata is a paradise for street food and understandably the fish preparations are the top sellers. If you have been to Kolkata and not tasted Dimer Devil or not visited the China Town……..you have wasted your time in the city. From Kashmir to Kanyakumari and from Gujarat to Arunachal the street food is distinctive of the region and a visitor can ill afford to give it a miss.

Bangkok is a city I like to visit because of the variety of street food it has to offer. While Suckhumvit 38 in the prestigious Thong Lo district is perhaps the most famous among Westerners, lesser known or completely unknown joints will often surprise you with their mouth-watering flavours.  A tiny, third-generation shop house, Nai Mong Hoi Nang Tort at Thanon Phlapplaachai, off Charoen Krung Road is the best place in the city to sample an oyster omelette, known locally as "hoy tod". It’s made up of a crisp and rich base of eggs topped with an unctuous sauce of oysters and spring onions. Sprinkle it with some white pepper and splash over the siracha chilli sauce and you'll understand why the place has been going for 40 years! A bonus that I reap every time is that street food constantly introduces me to new ingredients, makes me aware of wonderful stories and allows me to meet the most incredible local people who allow you to delve deeper and understand their true way of life!

In Ho Chi Min city you can literally live on street food starting from an early breakfast with bun thit nuong (char-grilled pork skewers with vermicelli noodles and fresh herbs), banh mi cha ca (a baguette filled with fish cakes), or chao long (a rice congee with offal).The classic dinner dishes such as banh xeo (crisp rice flour crepe with mung beans and prawn and pork) and bo la lot (char-grilled betel leaves with beef, wrapped in rice paper). I always ask how old the food stall is and the older the better is my motto. If it has been passed on to the second generation…..then go for it! They should specialise in just one dish, so you know they do it well. The ingredients are all laid out in front of you, so you can see how fresh it is, and then they prepare and cook it up before your very eyes.

Duck satay, Chicken  satay and Rabbit datay
Kuala Lumpur street food dishes include char-grilled chicken wings, ducks feet, ducks tongue, wok-tossed salt and chilli crab, pork baguette roll, pan-seared rice cakes with egg and soy as well as duck embryo cooked in tamarind, or simply boiled. These may not be authentic Malaysian stuff but the city is a melting pot of many cultures and so the variety in its street food is all the more expected.

In Shanghai the essential dishes to try include xiao long bao - soup dumplings that are incredible when done well, hairy crabs if they are in season, and also the steamed bread buns filled with sweet pork are exceptional. Singaporeans are known for their food promiscuity. Changi Village Food Centre  is truly a local food paradise, with a stall or two selling virtually every kind of Singaporean dish. One stall, one or two dishes, and that's it. They do one thing and they do it superbly. The best thing about this place is that it's near the airport so if you have a long stopover you can easily visit and get a quick Singaporean food fix. If you only have one day in Singapore, this is the place you want to eat at.

Australia is again a wonderland for street food and the immigrants from all over the world have brought with them their mama’s recipes and made Australia a culinary rich country. So whether it is the Greek or Italian or Lebanese or Chinese or Indian, there is food for every taste bud. Lygon Street in Melbourne and Circular Quay in Sydney have joints serving kebabs and souvlakis and sausage sizzles and Baba ganushi which are courtesy the Greek and Lebanese immigrants of the city and made a place of their own in the culinary history of Australia.   And how can you forget the Australian pie sold in the footie stadiums and pie floater served from pie carts in Adelaide!

Latin Americans have mastered the street food art. Choripan is a barbequeued sausage wrapped in French bread very popular in Argentina. Pao de queijo is cheese bread and Mate Gelado is ice tea and these are available everywhere in Rio de Jenario. Santiago boasts of sopaipillas – a deep fried dough of flour and pumpkin, French fries, churros and calzones rotos.

Street food in Torronto
Europe has a culture of eating in the open in road side cafes. From coffee in Sewden to ice creams of various flavours in Italy to a wide range of confectioneries in Germany, Europe remains a haven for street food. The big street food trucks are a gastronomic delight in America whether you are in Chicago or Miami, Seattle or Washington DC. The burgers, sandwiches, hot dogs and the special delights from Porto Rico, Cuba and Mexico are all served from these food trucks! Fish taco served on fried bread in Alaska, shaved ice and plate lunch of rice, macaroni salad and portion of meat in Hawaii, hot dogs, middle eastern falafel, Jamaican jerk chicken and Belgian waffles  in New York City all are a part of the American culture you are sure to miss if you are not a crazy street foodie!


In all my travelling experience the street food has been the best food. I would like to choose a place where the locals eat. The best way to experience a rich heritage is through food, and there's no shortage of it in any city you visit. You may offend a local if you talk about politics or religion, but food is a topic which brings a smile in every face!

Tuesday 6 October 2015

WHAT IF NETAJI SUBHASH BOSE WOULD HAVE BEEN OUR FIRST PRIME MINISTER?

Our Prime Minister often says that instead of Nehru, imagined what the India of today would look like if Sardar Patel was our first Prime Minister?

I ask you today imagine where would we be today if Netaji was our first Prime Minister? 

He was far more popular and far more charismatic than either Nehru or Patel. His leadership was virtually unchallenged and he led by example from the front. Such was his personality that both Nehru and Jinnah were in awe of him and never spoke a word to antagonize him. Azad Hind Fauj had a fair share of Muslims and the Muslims of undivided Bengal accepted him as their unquestioned leader just as the Hindus did. 

If Gandhi ji did not make the mistake of putting Nehru ahead of him, who knows we could have avoided the partition! 

He was far ahead of his time and a true visionary. He had friends everywhere and the world loved and respected him. He would encourage a new country to strive, sacrifice, toil and sweat and not resort to begging for food grains fit for animal consumption like PL 480. He would have created a far more self confident Nation, strategically always caring for her self interests and not falling into the stupid trap of left of centre politics.

Now that the classified files on Netaji are being de-classified, I will not be surprised to know about a grand conspiracy to keep him out of the country after independence. The fact that there was no such plane crash in Formosa (Taiwan) is now beyond doubt. The fact that the Azad Hind Fauj's bravery and valor sowed the seeds of revolt in the Indians of the then British Army is also a proven fact today. Whether non-violence and spinning charkha got us independence is being seriously questioned by the new age historians who quote Clement Attlee, who dismissed Gandhi as just an irritant and Bose as a threat to British interests. National Security advisor Ajit Doval has a story to tell and you must read this: 

http://www.niticentral.com/2014/11/25/ajit-doval-subhash-bose-british-india-246597.html

Babasahab Ambedkar too has a similar story to tell about Clement Attlee and his morbid fear of the revolt in Indian Army caused by the Valor and sacrifice of I.N.A, 

http://swarajyamag.com/politics/bose-not-gandhi-ended-british-rule-in-india-ambedkar/

Kingshuk Nag, author of a biography of Modi, quoted Russian intelligence sources who said Netaji had not perished in the air crash in Taihoku, in Taiwan, but found his way to the USSR, where he found himself on the wrong side of Joseph Stalin and was packed off to Yakutsk in Siberia. Nag claims that Netaji perished in the minus 50 degree Celsius environs of the Kolyama Highway in the Stalinist era. 

While Netaji’s death remains a mystery, attempts were also on to erase his memory and that of the INA. Lord Mountbatten, as Commander in chief of the Allied Forces in South East Asia, ordered the demolition of the monument built in Singapore’s Esplanade Park for the INA-martyrs. Later, as Viceroy of India, he made it a precondition for India’s Independence that no soldier of the INA would be re-inducted into the Indian Army. Nehru accepted this. In 1951, when told about reports that Bose was in the USSR, Nehru had brushed it aside as “American propaganda”. 

I would request you to read about the charismatic personality of Netaji to understand what a huge loss it was to the Nation when he, the popular choice of the people, was sidelined, betrayed and forgotten by the 2nd. generation of rulers of India, the Congress.
  

CAPITAL PUNISHMENT.....WE ARE STILL CONFUSED

The courts have sent 5 convicts of the Mumbai train blasts to the gallows. It is time for action replay of the debate on morality of the death sentence. Shashi Tharoor, my friend is absolutely against it, On the issue of abolition of capital punishment I am prepared to go almost all the way with Shashi. So long as we are talking about fellow human beings I am with him but when we are treating rapists who brutalize and kill or terrorists to do the same in mass scale, I will let him go alone on that path. I love dogs but am a firm believer of putting down rabid ones to save those whom I love more. The Nithari killers, the Nirbhaya killers, the Ajmals and the Yakoobs are rabid and need to be eliminated.........and I care two hoots about their caste, creed, religion, ethnicity, colour of skin and odor of sweat. Hoping to reform them is high risk romanticism bordering on insanity. Yes, to this I will add just one caveat......justice should be swift and not take 23 years. It is swift justice that keeps Singapore, Dubai and Israel a very high risk location for criminals.

Capital punishment is not an eye for an eye, it is a surgical interventions for a malignancy in the society. The earlier we do it the safer the society is. If justice was swift we could have avoided many subsequent acts of terrorism. We had let the cancer fester for 23 years.........how can we expect cure? Why can't Nithari and Nnirbhaya cases be solved within 3 months by fast tracking. If hospitals can work 24x7 why can't the courts?