Skilling the Agriculture Sector for Jobs and Sustainable Development through TNE

Agriculture in India have an approximate share of 18% in GDP and over 50% in employment. With a stagnant manufacturing sector, and services requiring higher human capital for entry, agriculture is the only recourse for India's surplus labour. However, the sector is characterized by low productivity, small/marginal farmers, lack of innovation/technological adoption and spoilage due to poor logistics and storage infrastructure. With the Indian government's new farm laws allowing farmers to sell their produce to a market outside designated state-regulated areas aimed at driving productivity and farm incomes up, the sector will need new skills and education for a complex agro-business environment emerging from the interaction between traditional farmers, corporate buyers and government agencies. Existing management and agricultural vocational courses are not specialist enough to cater for these new skills, which we aim to fill through our proposed course and curriculum development.