buy all these in time and cultivate her land. This means that along with water, we also need to provide cheap agricultural credit to the farmers for farming to improve. We will look at some of these needs in Chapter , Money and Credit . Another way by which we can tackle this problem is to identify, promote and locate industries and services in semi-rural areas where a large number of people may be employed.
For instance, suppose many farmers decide to grow arhar and chickpea (pulse crops). Setting up a dal mill to procure and process these and sell in the cities is one such example. Opening a cold storage could give an opportunity for farmers to store their products like potatoes and onions and sell them when the price is good. In villages near forest areas, we can start honey collection centres where farmers can come and sell wild honey.
It is also possible to set up industries that process vegetables and agricultural produce like potato, sweet potato, rice, wheat, tomato, fruits, which can be sold in outside markets. This will provide employment in industries located in semi-rural areas and not necessarily in large urban centres. Do you know that in India about per cent of the population belongs to the age group - years? Out of this, only about per cent are attending educational institutions.
The rest and particularly those aged less than years may be at home or What groups of people do you think are unemployed or underemployed in your area? Can you think of some measures that could be taken up for them? Gur Making in Haryana