Enhanced food grains production and productivity in general, and in rain-fed areas in particular, would pave the way for an autonomous, decentralised PDS which should be the goal of public policy in India’s march to food and nutrition security, the former secretary said. "We need to build on some of the existing programmes through an appropriate strategy for increased agricultural production, with a new emphasis on dryland agriculture," Venugopal said. Some of the programmes also need drastic overhaul and all these programmes have to be viewed as complementing one another so that necessary linkages are created to make food and nutrition security a reality in terms of quantity and quality, he pointed out. He also suggested to merge the beneficiaries of ‘Antyodaya Anna Yojana’ and the ‘Annapurna Scheme’ and provide them food grains free of cost. After the merger the programme can be named as ‘Antyodaya Anna Yojana’, he said.