STUDY ON CROP DIVERSIFICATION IN MANDI DISTRICT OF HIMACHAL PRADESH
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Date
2018-07-24
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CSKHPKV, Palampur
Abstract
Crop diversification is a strategy of shifting from less profitable to more profitable crops, changing variety and cropping pattern. It is considered to have large potentiality of increasing income and providing strength through reduced instabilities particularly under the situation of risk and capital constraints. The agricultural development in the state has made rapid strides as is evident from the increase in production and productivity of different food and non-food crops. The area under vegetable crops in state increased from 67968 hectares in 2011-12 to 76947 hectares in 2016-17. The production of vegetables which was 13.5 lakh tonnes in 2011-12 increased to 16.5 lakh tonnes during 2016-17 recorded a tremendous increase of about three times during a period of these years. The process of crop diversification towards fruits and off-season vegetables like peas, tomato, capsicum, cabbage, cauliflower and beans etc. is more pronounced in district of Kinnaur, Lahaul & Spiti, Solan, Sirmaur, Kullu, and parts of Mandi, Chamba, Bilaspur and Kangra. The present study, therefore, was carried out to study the impact of crop diversification on cropping pattern, resource use, income and employment in Mandi district of Himachal Pradesh. The study was based on data collected from 60 farmers selected randomly from selected villages of two blocks namely, Sadar and Sundernagar. The results indicated that after crop diversification, maximum proportion of total cropped area (66.97%) was allocated to vegetable crops of which 29.60 per cent was under kharif season vegetables and 37.37 per cent was under rabi season vegetables. Tomato in kharif season shared the maximum proportion (7.00%) while in rabi season the maximum proportion of the total cropped area was shared by Pea (8.09%). The total cost of cultivation per ha was estimated to be highest in tomato (Rs. 214466). The major component of cost was human labour which accounted for 33 per cent of total cost in all the vegetable crops. The output-input ratio was found highest in cucumber (1.46:1) on an average farm. On an average farm, the maximum employment was generated through farm activities (66.28%) followed by non-farm activities (23.73%). The average total annual income on average category of farms was recorded to be Rs. 230310 of which (48.79%) were generated from farm activities. There appeared a direct relationship between the diversification index and per hectare net agricultural income which showed that with the increase in crop diversification, the net agricultural income per hectare also increased in the study area. The pertinent problems faced by the farmers in the study area were low price of output, incidence of insect/pest and diseases, scarcity of human labour and non-availability of credit at right time etc
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