Seminar on Rural Transformation in North East India
Last Date for Paper Submission : 5th December 2019

TWO-DAY
REGIONAL SEMINAR
On
Rural Transformation in North East India : Patterns and Challenges
13 & 14 December 2019

Organised by:
Department of Economics
Manipur University
Imphal, Manipur, India

Sponsored by:
North Eastern Council
Ministry of DONER


CONCEPT NOTE

Rural transformation in India has failed to meet the aspirations of the people as livelihood transformations are slow and sufficient income and employment generations are not forthcoming for a dignified participation in India’s growth and development narrative. While the urban and industrial sectors are leading a resurgent Indian economy, the vast rural sector of the country is yet tenuously linked to the growth engines of industry and services, such that acute rural and farm distress still remains a hallmark of rural India.

The shadows of rural underdevelopment and distress are deeper in the Northeast India, one of the most backward regions of the country. With 81 pc of the population residing in rural areas, industrialisation yet a distant dream and India’s Act East Policy for the Northeast yet to be rooted, short and medium term concerns of development and livelihoods in the region, have to be largely addressed through strategies and policies of rural transformation. Rural transformation of the Region has to primarily look for food and income securities in the short run.

Policy frameworks and designs have to be strategized in such a way that the agrarian and rural nonfarm sectors serve, in the medium term, as the basic platform for agro-based industrialization of the region that has vital linkages with India’s Act East Policy and the ASEAN economies. The immediate task at hand is identifying the patterns and challenges of rural transformation in the region so that new directions are grounded on needs as well as development prospects in the long term.

The Hills/Plains dichotomies, institutional differentials, resource endowments, prospective value chains and market integration, comparative advantage tradable goods production, technology content and competitiveness are issues that have to be squarely addressed. A review of rural development policies is therefore incumbent. The seminar is therefore about how the rural farm and non-farm sectors of Northeast India have evolved and whether the patterns of change are sustainable and well directed and suggest new directions and policy frameworks that are implementable, acceptable and pragmatic in the given complex political economy dynamics in the region.

The broad themes of the seminar are as under. Field survey based papers in the areas shall have primary considerations.

A. Agrarian Change & Diversification

1. Political economy of development in NE
2. Agrarian structure & commercialization of agriculture
3. Farm diversification & high value crops
4. Plantation economy of NE
5. Rural Labour
6. Land systems of tribal North East and agricultural development

B. Rural non-farm sector growth

1. RNFS structure , composition & Income
2. Handloom, handicrafts & textiles
3. Rural MSMEs & Industrialization

C. Rural Development

1. Impact of rural development programmes
2. Rural inequality & poverty
3. Rural-urban linkages

Abstracts within 500 words and full papers within 6000 words in MS-word using Chicago style of citation should be submitted by email to the Organising Secretary. All accepted papers will be discussed by discussants hence no incomplete paper will be accepted for presentation. Paper presenters will be given about two months time to revise and update their papers, as an edited volume/book will be coming out from this seminar.

Last date of full paper (with abstract) submission: 5th December 2019
Communication about acceptance of paper: 7th December 2019
Last date of registration: 12th December 2019
Registration Fee: Rs. 500

No TA will be paid for attending the seminar. Outstation paper presenters will be given a modest boarding and lodging in the campus.

Seminar Convenor
Prof. Ch. Priyoranjan Singh
Department of Economics, Manipur University
Organising Secretary
Dr. Hanjabam Isworchandra Sharma
Assistant Professor, Department of Economics, Manipur University