Over 50K Farmers in Gujarat Buy Crop Insurance Online

Having faced successive droughts, farmers have started taking crop insurance seriously with more than 50,000 of them in Gujarat registering for the new crop insurance cover PMFBY via the State portal.Under the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) launched this year, farmers’ premium has been kept between 1.5-2 per cent for foodgrains and oilseed crops and up to 5 per cent for horticultural and cotton crops. And there is no cap on the premium.

 “Farmers in drought-hit States have taken crop insurance seriously this time. More than 50,000 farmers have so far enrolled for PMFBY for the 2016-17 kharif season in Gujarat via the State portal on crop insurance,” a senior Agriculture Ministry official told PTI.Gujarat is the only State that is enrolling farmers under the scheme strictly through its e-portal at present. In other States, including Uttar Pradesh, farmers are being registered by concerned agencies, including banks, and Primary Agricultural Credit Society (PACS), he said.

“The exact number of farmers registered for the scheme both online and through other ways would be known later. Once the banks upload the details of insured farmers on the Central crop insurance scheme portal, it will be known to all stakeholders,” he added.Taking a cue from Gujarat, the official said, the Karnataka government has also prepared its State portal for PMFBY, which will be launched soon.Both the portals of Gujarat and Karnataka governments will be integrated with the Central crop insurance portal, which is being upgraded with information down to the village level.

As of now, 11 States – Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Odisha, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Uttarakhand and West Bengal – and Union Territory Andaman and Nicobar Islands have notified the PMFBY.The Agriculture Ministry has empanelled 11 private sector companies and State-owned Agriculture Insurance Company (AIC) to implement the scheme. It is also actively considering to empanel four State-run general insurance companies.PMFBY replaces the existing two schemes National Agricultural Insurance Scheme and Modified NAIS, which have had some inherent drawbacks.