Dynamics of land use pattern and agricultural production scenario in India with particular reference to Punjab
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Date
2017
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Punjab Agricultural University, Ludhiana
Abstract
The present study, based on secondary data, was conducted to bring forth the over time changes in land use pattern of India with particular reference to Punjab. An attempt was also made to carry out the comparative evaluation of performance of agriculture and to enumerate the potential correlates of land use pattern and agricultural performance parameters in 15 major agricultural states of India for the time frame, 1980-81 to the latest available. India has geographical area of 328.7 million hectares. A close scrutiny of its land use matrix, consisting of three sub-sectors namely ecological sector, agriculture sector and non-agricultural sector, revealed that three states (Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh) have predominance of agriculture sector (more than three fourth of the reporting area). The net sown area of Punjab (2.96 % of the country’s cropped area) accounted for 97.1 per cent of the state’s agricultural land, whereas only 57.7 per cent of Tamil Nadu’s agricultural land was under plough indicating divergent patterns followed by states in the land use matrix. The cropping intensity of India increased from 123.1 per cent in 1980-81 to 138.9 per cent in 2012-13, which was far below the level attained by Punjab (189.6 %) connoting inter-state differentials in the utilization of land potential. The agricultural production performance assessed from production profile of crops crucial for food security, employment potential of agriculture, value of output and Net State Domestic Product from agriculture and allied on net area sown basis also highlighted widespread inter-state differentials. The application of Kendall’s coefficient of concordance testified that the state rankings with respect to selected land use and agricultural production parameters were in conformity (p<0.05) indicating strong association between the land use and agricultural performance parameters. The convergence analysis of agricultural performance proxied by Net State Domestic Product from agriculture and allied activities per hectare of net area sown was carried out for the four time periods:1980-81 to 1989-90, 1990-91 to 1999-00, 2000-01 to 2012-13 and overall study period. The results provided strong evidence of - convergence as indicated by estimated statistically significant coefficient for the period 2000-01 to 2012-13 implying that the states have started giving the signs of convergence post 2000 at the rate 2.7 per cent per year. The analysis has very well established that poor performing states have started catching up with the states, well known for their agricultural advancement and this would in its own right lead to food secure and prosperous India.
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