Crops of Conflict

As water and climate become instruments of geopolitical leverage, India has an opportunity to turn agricultural resilience into a new form of South-South diplomacy. Climate change is making an old truth harder to ignore: food security is national security. As water becomes scarcer, harvests more erratic and trade policies more protectionist, agriculture is moving from the margins of geopolitics to its centre. Nowhere is this clearer than in Africa, where fragile food systems intersect with...

min read

As water and climate become instruments of geopolitical leverage, India has an opportunity to turn agricultural resilience into a new form of South-South diplomacy. Climate change is making an old truth harder to ignore: food security is national security. As water becomes scarcer, harvests more erratic and trade policies more protectionist, agriculture is moving from the margins of geopolitics to its centre. Nowhere is this clearer than in Africa, where fragile food systems intersect with contested rivers, conflict and disrupted supply chains. For India, this presents not merely a humanitarian challenge but an opportunity to practise a more strategic form of food diplomacy. Clear Warning The Nile basin offers the clearest warning. Egypt, Sudan and Ethiopia depend heavily on the river, directly or indirectly, for agriculture and livelihoods. Egypt obtains roughly 90-95 percent of its water from the Nile, with most of its withdrawals going to agriculture. Wheat, rice, maize and cotton are therefore inseparable from the country's water security. Sudan is similarly dependent on the Main Nile and its Blue and White Nile tributaries for crops including sorghum, wheat, cotton and sugarcane. Ethiopia, by contrast, relies much more heavily on rain-fed agriculture, but the Blue Nile remains crucial to its plans for agricultural and economic expansion. The Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam (GERD) has transformed this already delicate equation. The Blue Nile supplies roughly 85 percent of the Nile's runoff, giving Ethiopia substantial geographical leverage upstream. Egypt and Sudan, downstream and more dependent on the river, have consequently viewed the dam through the prism of food and water security. The dispute has its roots partly in the 1959 agreement that allocated Nile waters between Egypt and Sudan, but the rise of Ethiopia as a major upstream power has altered the political balance. The stakes are enormous. A disruption to water availability is not simply an environmental problem when millions depend on irrigated agriculture. It can affect food prices, livelihoods, migration and political stability. Across the basin, the consequences potentially extend to hundreds of millions of people. The lesson is straightforward: rivers can become geopolitical infrastructure, and crops can become strategic assets. Critical Role This is where India can play a useful role. Its longstanding diplomatic, commercial and maritime links with Africa give it an established platform. Its experience in producing wheat, rice and millets, meanwhile, gives it something more tangible: the ability to contribute to food-supply resilience. Egypt, for instance, remains heavily dependent on imports and is projected to require around 13 million tonnes of wheat imports to bridge its consumption gap. Sudan’s agricultural crisis is still more acute. Conflict and climate stress have sharply reduced cereal production, leaving output well below recent historical averages. India could therefore build food diplomacy around two complementary tracks. The first is supply. Predictable grain arrangements and strategic food buffers could help vulnerable countries absorb shocks in international markets. The second is technology. India's experience with micro-irrigation, precision farming and water-use efficiency offers tools that may help African farmers produce more with less water. The Per Drop More Crop component of the Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana is one example. Drip irrigation, improved canal management, seepage reduction and precision agriculture cannot resolve a dispute over the Nile, but they can reduce the amount of water required to produce a given crop. For this to become a durable strategy, however, India will need to move beyond individual projects. Bilateral agricultural agreements with African countries could be converted into longer-term trade corridors and grain-supply arrangements. Multilateral platforms, including BRICS, could provide mechanisms for greater transparency in food distribution and market stabilisation. Seed exchanges could focus on drought-tolerant millets, biofortified wheat and heat-resistant maize suited to increasingly volatile climates. Indian private enterprise could be brought into this architecture. Agritech startups and Farmer-Producer Organisations could be encouraged to enter African markets through export-linked grants, incubation programmes and risk-sharing mechanisms. EXIM Bank credit lines and export guarantees could reduce the financial risks of deploying solar cold chains, irrigation systems and agricultural technologies in politically volatile markets. Public-private partnerships could also help Indian firms adapt AI-based crop advisory systems and IoT-enabled water sensors to African soils and farming practices. The larger opportunity is strategic. India’s relationship with Africa need not be confined to trade, infrastructure or diplomatic declarations. Agriculture offers a practical form of South-South cooperation in which food, technology and water efficiency reinforce one another. (The writer is a member of Maharashtra Agriculture Price Commission. Views personal.

NMIA fails to live up to the promise

Bhalchandra Chorghade

Sep 6

3 min read

Three million passengers are recorded but the tag of world-class airport remains elusive

Mumbai: Less than nine months after opening its doors, Navi Mumbai International Airport (NMIA) has crossed the three-million-passenger mark, signalling strong demand for the long-awaited second airport of the Mumbai Metropolitan Region. Yet, for many passengers, the experience on the ground has been markedly different from the image of a world-class airport that accompanied the project’s launch.

NMIA crossed the milestone on September 1, having handled around 22,500 commercial flights since commencing operations on December 25, 2025. Its network has expanded from 13 destinations at launch to 46, while scheduled international operations began within 200 days. The airport also reported that the last checked-in bag reached the carousel within 30 minutes on 94% of flights in August.

On paper, therefore, the airport is making rapid progress. But passenger complaints over expensive and scarce cabs, inadequate public transport, terminal amenities, signage, connectivity and basic logistics raise a larger question: has NMIA’s infrastructure evolved as quickly as its passenger numbers?

Last-Mile Journey

The most persistent grouse remains the last-mile journey. Passengers arriving at the airport have complained of limited availability of reasonably priced taxis and app-based cabs, with some alleging that drivers push passengers towards higher-priced categories. Similar complaints about cab scarcity and steep fares have surfaced repeatedly since the airport opened.

For a passenger from Mumbai’s western suburbs, the problem is particularly acute.

“The flight may take less than an hour, but getting home can take longer and cost almost as much as the flight in some cases. The airport is beautiful in concept, but the last-mile connectivity is still not worthy of an international airport,” said Shrikant Teli, a Mumbai resident who recently travelled through NMIA.

Less Choices

Another passenger said the issue was not merely the fare but the absence of choice. “Once you come out with luggage, you don’t really have much bargaining power. If the cheaper cab is not available, you either wait or pay more. This defeats the whole purpose of having a new airport,” he said not wishing to be named.

Interestingly, the airport itself lists buses, trains, taxis and app-based cabs among its connectivity options, with Panvel and Bamandongri identified as nearby rail stations. The Maharashtra government had also launched Bharat Taxi at NMIA in July, specifically pitching it as a transparent, no-surge, no-hidden-charge alternative to conventional app-based services.

But transport experts say the issue cannot be solved merely by adding more cabs.

“An airport is not just a terminal and runway. It is a mobility system. Unless passengers can move seamlessly between the airport, rail, metro, buses and road network, the airport experience remains incomplete,” said an urban transport expert on condition of anonymity.

Under Scrutiny

The terminal itself has also come under scrutiny. Passengers have earlier flagged inadequate signage, poor mobile connectivity, difficulties with app-based payments and a lack of basic passenger services. More recent complaints have included expensive food, non-functional charging points and irregular availability of drinking water.

“For a brand-new airport, passengers naturally expect everything to work from day one. Some teething problems are understandable, but after eight months, basic facilities should not be a recurring complaint,” said Kaustubh Pande, a Navi Mumbai resident who frequently travels by air.

There is also a logistical irony. NMIA was conceived not merely as another airport but as a solution to Mumbai’s capacity constraints and eventually as a major aviation and cargo hub. The airport’s first phase is designed for 20 million passengers annually, with the ultimate capacity planned at 90 million.

The pressure on the new facility is only set to increase. From October 1, around 30 per cent of international traffic is scheduled to shift from Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj International Airport to NMIA, making efficient connectivity and passenger handling even more critical.

The three-million passenger milestone therefore tells only half the story. It proves that travellers are willing to use NMIA; it does not necessarily prove that they are satisfied with it.

For an airport intended to redefine Mumbai’s aviation ecosystem, the real test will be whether the passenger journey—from home to terminal and back—is as seamless as the vision promised.

At present, NMIA appears to have won the demand test, but is still struggling with the experience test.

Crops of Conflict

NMIA fails to live up to the promise

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