Migratory Dilemmas
- Around 100 million informal workers have returned to their villages.
- Job loss due to lockdown.
- Pandemic turned into an economic crisis.
- Govt՚s revival package has offered them only more debt.
- Is generally the month of May when most of the migrants return to their original and seasonal source of livelihood i.e.. farming.
Forced Migration
- Millions of workers were forced to return to their villages for the past two months.
- Not usual monsoon reverse migration.
- Informal workers contribute around 10% to India՚s GDP.
- Economic fate of the country is decided by these informal workers.
- Agriculture contributes 15 - 16% GDP.
- Unseasonal rainfalls and extreme weather events damaging winter cash crops further cut their meagre earnings.
Displaced People Misplaced Mindset
- In India internal displacements are common due to disasters like cyclones and floods.
- More than 5 million new displacements in 2019 in the World as per Geneva based Internal Displacement Monitoring System (IDMC) .
- Extreme weather events triggered the bulk of the displacements being linked to climate change.
- 2.6 million New displacements were triggered in India which say the wettest monsoon in 25 years.
- Cyclone Fani further resulted to displacement of 1.8 million new displacements.
- Due to lockdown 55% of farmers stored their crops as they were unable to sell them.
- The IDMC Survey:
- To evaluate the impact of lockdown on agricultural production and livelihood.
- Conducted by Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health, Public Health Foundation of India and Centre for Sustainable Agriculture from May 3 to May 15,2020.
- States participated in the survey include Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Haryana, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Punjab, Rajasthan, Telangana, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal.
- Unexpected weather changes was also cited as a reason for the loss in yield by 80% of farmers.
✍Examrace Team at Aug 20, 2021