Images of thousands of farmers streaming into India’s capital on tractors and carrying banners to decry potentially devastating changes in agricultural policy can seem a world away, but the protests in New Delhi raise issues that resonate in the United States and have led to dramatic change in rural America.
Indian farmers have left their homes more than two months ago to camp outside the capital New Delhi to demand the repeal of laws they believe would end guaranteed pricing and force them to sell to powerful corporations rather than government-run markets.
Despite decades of economic growth, nearly half of India’s population relies on growing crops on small parcels of land, typically less than 1.5 hectares (3 acres), and farmers worry that without guaranteed prices they will be forced to sell their land and lose their livelihoods.