All India Kisan Sabha by joining hands with All India Agriculture Workers Union (AIAWU) will host a national conference on ‘Agrarian Crisis and Alternative Policies’ here on July 11 and 12.

“The workshop will explore the role of worker, peasant and social cooperatives in building alternatives to the existing system, minimum support price and minimum wages in order to reverse the crisis in agriculture,” T Sagar, General Secretary of Telangana Rythu Sangham, a constituent body of All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS), has said.

The conference will be inaugurated by T M Thomas Issac, Finance Minister of Kerala. AIKS President Ashok Dhawale will take part. Around 200 delegates from different parts of the country will attend the two-day meet. He said the conference is being organised in the back drop of global recession and its impact on Indian economy as a whole and on agriculture and rural development in particular.

“The farmers need to mobilise themselves around specific crops, establish collective ownership on agro processing industries and retail market to eliminate the exploitation,” he said. “The crisis in agricultural sector is reflected in growing indebtedness, peasant suicides, large scale migration and lack of economic viability in cultivation,” he said.

“Developing struggles to launch cooperative movement will provide ample space to mobilise farmers. We need to promote cooperatives beyond political affiliations and we will extend all support to peasantry in that endeavour,” an AIAWU leader said.