This document provides an overview of agriculture in India. It discusses the types of agriculture practiced in India, including primitive subsistence farming, intensive subsistence farming, and commercial farming. It also describes India's cropping patterns of rabi, kharif, and zaid seasons and major crops grown, including rice, wheat, oilseeds, horticulture crops, and fiber crops. The document then examines factors responsible for low agricultural productivity in India and institutional and technological reforms to modernize Indian agriculture.
This document provides an overview of agriculture in India. It discusses the types of agriculture practiced in India, including primitive subsistence farming, intensive subsistence farming, and commercial farming. It also describes India's cropping patterns of rabi, kharif, and zaid seasons and major crops grown, including rice, wheat, oilseeds, horticulture crops, and fiber crops. The document then examines factors responsible for low agricultural productivity in India and institutional and technological reforms to modernize Indian agriculture.
This document provides an overview of agriculture in India. It discusses the types of agriculture practiced in India, including primitive subsistence farming, intensive subsistence farming, and commercial farming. It also describes India's cropping patterns of rabi, kharif, and zaid seasons and major crops grown, including rice, wheat, oilseeds, horticulture crops, and fiber crops. The document then examines factors responsible for low agricultural productivity in India and institutional and technological reforms to modernize Indian agriculture.
This document provides an overview of agriculture in India. It discusses the types of agriculture practiced in India, including primitive subsistence farming, intensive subsistence farming, and commercial farming. It also describes India's cropping patterns of rabi, kharif, and zaid seasons and major crops grown, including rice, wheat, oilseeds, horticulture crops, and fiber crops. The document then examines factors responsible for low agricultural productivity in India and institutional and technological reforms to modernize Indian agriculture.
0.1 INTRODUCTION India is an agriculturally important country. Two-thirds of its population is engaged in agricultural activities. Some agricultural products like tea, coffee, spices, etc are also exported.
0.2 TYPES OF AGRICULTURE
Over these years, cultivation methods have changed significantly depending upon the characteristics of physical environment, technological know-how and socio-cultural practices
1. PRIMITIVE SUBSISTENCE FARMING
Primitive subsistence agriculture is practised on small patches of land with the help of primitive tools like hoe, dao and digging sticks. This type of farming depends upon monsoon, natural fertility of the soil and suitability of other environmental conditions to the crops grown. It is a ‘slash and burn’ agriculture. Farmers clear a patch of land and produce cereals and other food crops to sustain their family. When the soil fertility decreases, the farmers shift and clear a fresh patch of land for cultivation. This type of shifting allows Nature to replenish the fertility of the soil through natural processes. It is known by different names. Crops grown : Cassava, millet, banana, corn etc. 2. Intensive Subsistence Farming This type of farming is practised in areas of high population pressure on land. It is labour- intensive farming, where high doses of biochemical inputs and irrigation are used for obtaining higher production. ”Right of inheritance’ has lead to the division of land among successive generations has rendered land-holding size uneconomical, the farmers con- tinue to take maximum output from the limited land in the absence of alternative source of livelihood. Thus, there is enormous pressure on agri- cultural land.
1 3. Commercial Farming Main characteristic : Use of higher doses of modern inputs, e.g. high yielding variety (HYV) seeds, chemical fertilisers, insecticides and pesti- cides in order to obtain higher productivity.
• Degree of commercialisation of agriculture varies from one region to
another. For example, rice is a commercial crop in Haryana and Punjab, but in Odisha, it is a subsistence crop.
0.2.1 PLANTATION
• Plantation is also a type of commercial farming.
• In this type of farming, a single crop is grown on a large area. • Plantations cover large tracts of land, using capital intensive inputs, with the help of migrant labourers. • All the produce is used as raw material in respective industries. • Since the production is mainly for market, a well- developed net- work of transport and communication connecting the plantation ar- eas, processing industries and markets plays an important role in the development of plantations. • IMPORTANT CROPS : In India, tea, coffee, rubber, sugarcane, banana, etc., are important plantation crops. Tea in Assam and North Bengal coffee in Karnataka
0.3 CROPPING PATTERN
• India has three cropping seasons — rabi, kharif and zaid.
1. Rabi crops are sown in winter from October to December and har- vested in summer from April to June. Though, these crops are grown in large parts of India, states from the north and north-western parts such as Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir,Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh are important for the production of wheat and other rabi crops. Availability of precipitation during winter months due to the western temperate cyclones helps in the success of these crops. Success of the green revolution in Punjab, Haryana, western Uttar Pradesh and parts of Rajasthan has also been an important factor in the growth of the above- mentioned rabi crops. IMPORTANT CROPS: wheat, barley, peas, gram and mustard. 2. Kharif crops are grown with the onset of monsoon in different parts of the country and these are harvested in September-October. IMPORTANT CROPS: Paddy, maize, jowar, bajra, tur (arhar), moong, urad, cotton, jute, groundnut and soyabean.
2 IMPORTANT RICE GROWING REGIONS : Assam, West Bengal, coastal regions of Odisha, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Maharashtra, particularly the (Konkan coast) along with Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. In states like Assam, West Bengal and Odisha, three crops of paddy are grown in a year. These are Aus, Aman and Boro. 3. In between the rabi and the kharif seasons, there is a short season during the summer months known as the Zaid season. IMPORTANT CROPS: watermelon, muskmelon, cucumber, veg- etables and fodder crops.
0.4 MAJOR CROPS
A variety of food and non food crops are grown in different parts of the country depending upon the variations in soil, climate and cultivation practices. Major crops grown in India are:- Rice, wheat, millets, pulses, tea, coffee, sugarcane, oil seeds, cotton and jute, etc.
0.4.1 OIL SEEDS
• In 2017 India was the second largest producer of groundnut in the world after China • In rapeseed production India was third largest producer in the world after Canada and China in 2017
• Different oil seeds are grown covering approximately 12 % of the total
cropped area of the country • Main oil-seeds produced in India are groundnut, mustard, coconut, sesa- mum (til), soyabean, castor seeds, cotton seeds, linseed and sunflower.
• Most of these are edible and used as cooking mediums. However, some of these are also used as raw material in the production of soap, cosmetics and ointments. • Groundnut is a kharif crop and accounts for about half of the major oilseeds produced in the country.
• Gujarat was the largest producer of groundnut followed by Rajasthan and
Andhra Pradesh in 2016–17 • Linseed and mustard are rabi crops • Sesamum is a kharif crop in north and rabi crop in south India.
• Castor seed is grown both as rabi and kharif crop
3 0.4.2 HORTICULTURE CROPS • In 2017, India was the second largest producer of fruits and vegetables in the world after China. • India is a producer of tropical as well as temperate fruits.
• Mangoes - Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Uttar Pradesh and
West Bengal • Oranges - Nagpur and Cherrapunjee (Meghalaya) • Bananas - Kerala, Mizoram, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu
• Apples, pears, apricots and walnuts - Jammu and Kashmir and Hi- machal Pradesh • India is an important producer of pea, cauliflower, onion, cabbage, tomato, brinjal and potato
0.4.3 FIBRE CROPS
• Cotton, jute, hemp and natural silk are the four major fibre crops grown in India. • first three are derived from the crops grown in the soil, the latter is ob- tained from cocoons of the silkworms fed on green leaves specially mul- berry.
• Rearing of silk worms for the production of silk fibre is known as sericulture
0.5 FACTORS RESPONSIBLE FOR LOW PRODUCTIV-
ITY IN INDIA 1. Over crowding or disguised unemployment in Agriculture 2. Problems in inadequacy of inputs for agriculture
3. Size of land holdings
4. Pattern of land tenure 5. Poor techniques of Production
4 0.6 INSTITUTIONAL REFORMS 1. collectivisation and consolidation of holdings 2. Abolition of Zamindari system 3. Land reforms like ceiling on land holdings were introduced 4. Establishment of Grameen Banks and cooperative societies and banks for providing loans to farmers 5. Kissan Credit Card (KCC), Personal Accidental Insurance Scheme (PAIS) was also introduced 6. Provision for crop insurances against drought, flood or cyclone were intro- duced 7. Special weather bulletins for farmers were introduced in TV and Radio
0.7 TECHNOLOGICAL REFORMS
1. Green Revolution in agriculture and White Revolution in milk were intro- duced 2. Tractors, harvesters, threshers, tube-wells and many such technological devices were introduced. 3. For better production fertilizers and pesticides were introduced. 4. Govt. announced Minimum Support Price (MSP) which checks the ex- ploitation of farmers by speculators and middle men.
0.8 CONTRIBUTION OF AGRICULTURE TO NATIONAL
ECONOMY 1. Shares of agriculture has registered a declining trend from 1951 onwards 2. In 2010-11 about 52 per cent of the total work force was employed by the farm sector which makes more than half of the Indian Population dependent on agriculture for sustenance. 3. Any decline and stagnation in agriculture will lead to a decline in other spheres of the economy having wider implications for society. 4. Government of India made concerted efforts to modernise agriculture. 5. Establishment of Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), agri- cultural universities, veterinary services and animal breeding centres, hor- ticulture development, research and development in the field of meteorol- ogy and weather forecast, etc. were given priority for improving Indian agriculture. Apart from this, improving the rural infrastructure was also considered essential for the same.
