😯 Challenges for India’s Millet Affair
India’s in love with millets. But this love affair could soon become toxic for us. Here’s how.
India is going back to its old love: millets.
From the government to FMCGs, everyone is flirting with millets.
Why old love?
Well, the love story between India and millets goes back to your grandma’s times.
India was madly in love with millets, until…
The new chicks walked into town: wheat and rice.
What next? We went running behind wheat and rice, putting millets in the friendzone.
However, we’ve now realised that our relationship with wheat and rice is toxic.
It’s giving us heartache, quite literally, as these grains can lead to cardiovascular diseases, diabetes and obesity.
And just like that, we’re back with millets again.
While we’re back to our old love, we’re still not treating millets right. We’re using them to produce everything from noodles to bhujia.
And this could turn our relationship with millets toxic again.
Today we’ll be looking at where India is going wrong with its Mission Millet and how we can correct this.
ReadOn.
🧑🤝🧑Why We’re With Millets Now?
First, let’s talk about why we’re in love with millets again.
Well, we need millets.
Wheat and rice are too high maintenance.
Rice needs around 120-140cm of rain or 5,000 litres of water per kg.
Millets only need 20 cm of rain or 250-300 litres of water per kg!
India is getting hotter and drier because of climate change. Focusing on millets will ensure that we still have food when the world is burning up.
Plus, millets are super-packed with nutrients like iron, copper and magnesium.
This is a boon for India, which is one of the most micro-nutrient deficient countries in the world. Malnutrition cost us Rs. 60 million per day from 2006-2018!
Now, millets have a super low yield of 1,111 kgs per hectare. Meanwhile, rice has a yield of 2,600 kgs per hectare and wheat has a yield of 3,500 kgs per hectare.
Which is why we broke up with them.
And so our per capita consumption of millets fell from 33 kg/year to 4 kg/year.
Result?
Farmers have stopped planting millets.
To encourage them, we have to increase consumption.
That’s where the government and other FMCGs come in.
💞 Aiding the Millet Love Story
The government is like the best friend aiding this love story.
It has planned to incentivise companies to make millet-based foods.
Incentives worth Rs. 800 crores have been planned for companies like Nestle India Ltd, Tata Consumer Products Ltd, ITC Ltd, Hindustan Unilever Ltd, Marico Ltd, Mrs Bector’s Food Speciality Ltd, Ravi Food Pvt Ltd and SWG Industries Ltd.
Now, companies may have gone a little too far with innovation.
They are making all kinds of millet products like atta, noodles, savoury snacks, cookies, soups, and even beer!
There are two problems with this:
Quality
Price
Let’s look at quality. A lot of snacks that are being produced from millets are going to be ultra-processed.
This means that to make millets tastier, these foods will contain a lot of fats, sugar, salt, preservatives, colours, and everything not nice.
So, all the goodness flushed down the drain.
And then these foods will be sold as ‘healthy’ foods. Obviously (not). Yup, the same way that full-of-sugar breakfast cereal is called healthy.
Plus, ultra-processed foods require a lot of water for processing. So, we’re not really lowering the water requirement by using millets.
Back to square one.
Now, companies that really want to make ‘healthy’ products will use pure millets without extra preservatives or colours.
The only problem? Super-high price.
These ultra-healthy products belong to the premium category. Meaning, the common folks can’t afford them on a regular basis.
So, millets and all their benefits still remain unavailable to the common people.
The trade-off is between price and quality.
Lower quality for the masses, or premium quality for the rich.
This is where the government really needs to aid this love affair of India and millets.
It needs to ensure that millet-based food made by companies is both healthy and affordable for the masses.
An article by Business Line had an interesting solution: the government should educate street vendors and have them use millets.
Imagine having panipuri made from millets, or millet pakode. Yes, these too are fried but don’t contain preservatives and additives.
The same thing can be done with restaurants too, encouraging them to include more millet-based dishes in their menus.
However, a focus on the final product alone won’t help. The government needs to also focus on the root (literally): on promoting millet cultivation.
🤔 How the Government Can Get Farmers in Love with Millets
The government can announce a Minimum Support Price (MSP) for different millet varieties.
Currently, there is an MSP only for bajra, jowar and ragi.
The government will also have to educate farmers about the benefits of millet and incentivise them to grow them.
And of course, more research and development will be needed to increase the yield of millets.
If we could achieve these goals, this relationship could be a happily ever after :)
Let us know your thoughts on millet-based processed foods in the comments. Have you included millets in your diet yet?
If you liked this article then stop keeping us a secret. Share this with your friends on WhatsApp and help us grow! :)
If you are coming here for the very first time: Don’t forget to join us on WhatsApp to get daily updates! 👇
Actually why? Street vendors, business selling packaged millet products these are all there. But indian households do have their traditional recipes on how to use the millets, so I think the solution is just to use that traditional wisdom and buy millets on loose and in that way farmers will get benefitted too with the demand.