Bharatiya Kisan Union Leader Opposes I2U2's Decision to Establish Food Parks in India

According to a senior spokesman of the Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU), the country has an agricultural surplus and there is no need for the government to collaborate with the United States, Israel, and the United Arab Emirates for food production. 

Yudhvir Singh, general secretary of the BKU, told the media that the organization will reject the food pact under the I2U2 grouping, arguing that the move will relegate farmers to landless peasants.

"In India, there is no scarcity of food." In reality, the agriculture industry, which employs at least 62 percent of the Indian population, is experiencing bumper crop output. As a result, such an agreement with other governments is not required.

The only reason they are doing this is to attract huge corporates into the Indian agriculture industry, reducing farmers to peasants," said Yudhvir Singh, who was at the vanguard of the year-long farmers' protest in 2020-21.

The statement comes a day after the UAE pledged $2 billion to create integrated food parks in India using American and Israeli technologies.

It is believed that the food parks in India would be linked to the high-tech food storage facilities that will be built in the UAE, as the Gulf country prepares to emerge as a global food giant.

Closer food collaboration between India and the UAE under I2U2 (India-Israel-USA-UAE) comes two and a half months after the two sides operationalized a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement (CEPA), which opened the door to close bilateral and multilateral economic cooperation. 

Singh, on the other hand, contended that by pledging to provide land for food parks and food corridors, India will cause greater long-term economic and social upheaval for its farming community. "Farming communities in France and the Netherlands are resisting corporatization, and we are now seeing similar moves in India," Singh added.

A joint statement issued after the I2U2 summit on Thursday declared that the investment from the UAE would be utilized to build a "series of integrated food parks across India that will incorporate state-of-the-art climate-smart technologies to reduce food waste and spoilage, conserve fresh water."