Impact of IR :
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Three Industrial revolutions reduced the dominance of the agriculture sector. They made the service and manufacturing sector dominant.
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This forced the agrarian workforce to shift to secondary and tertiary sectors of the economy.
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The advent of the Industrial Revolution (IR) 4.0 will make this situation more complex.
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The use of new technologies in IR 4.0 will lead to job losses in the service and manufacturing sectors.
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New techs include Artificial Intelligence, robotics, cognitive analytics, 3D printing, genomics.
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Thus, the industries employing a huge population from the agriculture sectors will have a reduced capacity for employment.
Present status of Agriculture sector :
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According to the FAO, about 60 percent of the global population, directly or indirectly, is still dependent on agriculture.
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However, its contribution to the world GDP is just about 4 percent. Whereas, the contribution of secondary and tertiary sectors to the economy is 90%.
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In India, the contribution of the agriculture sector to GDP is 12-15 percent. Though it is higher than the world average, it is still much less, compared to the contribution from other sectors of the economy.
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Centre and state governments are continuously trying to improve the economic status of the farmers. Yet, their efforts are unable to deliver a sustainable increase in their per capita income.
Thus, there is an urgent need to think about the way to avoid the possible employment crisis of the future. It involves increasing the productivity of the agriculture sector and farmer’s income.