Elvino wrote:
"It is not the exact truth why agriculture is a dying industry in Goa that
it
is because of the lack of
manpower. People have stopped cultivating lands because it is not feasible
due to high cost of Labour in Goa now. The migrant if welcomed by Marlon
they are still excessively available in Goa but Goans still find the labour
is very expensive. Since they (migrants) are already available in very
excessive numbers whether Arwin, Soter or Rajan like it or not but the
agriculture labour still very expensive and to much laborious. This is the
real reason and Marlon got it wrong why the lands are not cultivated."
Comment:
I agree with a lot of what Elvino says.
Firstly, Goa's agriculture land holdings were meant to build self-reliant
and self-sustained families and were not meant for profits. There are
families in maharashtra sustaining themselves on 1 acre of land. Our
agriculture was not meant to hire labour. Family members chipped in. If at
all extra labour was need it worked on a barter system called 'bodlo'. I
give 3 days in your field you give me 3 days in return in my field. If at
all wages were paid for those who did not have fields, they were given a
worth in kind like so many measures of paddy and so on. Thereby the food
stock of landless persons was also built up.
Secondly, The migrants have not done any favour to Goans. Instead they have
carefully orchestrated a situation whereby they eliminated all local labour.
The migrants are now exploiting the situation which has made them
unaffordable to the Goan. How did they do it? When our local labour wage was
Rs. 120, these migrants were ready to work for Rs. 80. This is similar to
how Philipino labour displaced Indian labour in the gulf. Foolish Goans
prefered to employ the migrants to save the Rs. 40. But the work of local
labour was of far superior quality when compared to that of the migrant and
any Goan who has personally worked in the fields will vouch for that. The
local labour is very aware of his worth and is not ready to be exploited by
the employer. So gradually the local labour finding no employment prefered
to stray away into other streams of livelihood No sooner that happened the
migrants raised their demands much more than what the local labour was
demanding. Secondly the migrant work force that works in the field descend
into Goa only after they have finished with their work in the fields back
home. Thereby there is a loss of time in the agriculture operations in Goa.
They treat Goa like the gulf and make as much money as they can and go
return to their village. The migrants in turn contribute to so many social
and health problems.
Thirdly, the soil conditions and other physical conditions have deteriorated
due to pollution of all kinds. Air and sunlight has been blocked by high
rise building, waste water, eroded soil finds its way into the fields along
with it is non bio-degradable garbage and so on. The bundhs have not been
maintained and often the mafia break the sluice gates and flood the fields
for fish farming. So also, the plough or power tillers are not available in
time and so on. These factors further increases the burden for the farmer
and makes agriculture non-profitable.
Fourthly, in case of paddy there is a hell lot of work till it reaches the
mill. Spaces for drying and boiling the paddy are diminishing. The present
generation of youngsters have not cultivated the physique and stamina for
such kind of work. The psyche of everyone is to look for a job in some
industry.
So matters are not so simple as is being made out by marlon and company.
