The National Commission on Farmers (NCF) is an institutional body, or commission, constituted by the Government of India, popularly known as the Swaminathan Commission. It was established on November 18, 2004, under the chairmanship of Professor M.S. Swaminathan, the "Father of the Green Revolution in India". The Commission was created to address the severe agrarian crisis in India, particularly the rising number of farmer suicides, and to formulate a holistic national policy for farmers.
The NCF submitted five reports between December 2004 and its final report on October 4, 2006. Its mechanism was to provide comprehensive recommendations across various domains, including land reforms, irrigation, credit, and insurance. The most widely discussed provision is the recommendation that the Minimum Support Price (MSP) should be set at a level that is at least 50% more than the weighted average cost of production (often termed the C2+50% formula). Other key recommendations included the establishment of an Agriculture Risk Fund to provide relief after natural calamities, shifting the unit for crop insurance assessment from the block to the village, and distributing ceiling-surplus and waste lands.
The NCF's work connects directly to the concept of MSP and the subsequent National Policy for Farmers, 2007, which was drafted based on its findings. It also recommended inserting "Agriculture" into the Concurrent List of the Constitution to allow both the Central and State governments to legislate on the subject. While the Commission itself was temporary, its core recommendations, especially the MSP formula, have not been replaced but remain a central, yet largely unimplemented, demand in the national discourse on agricultural policy.