Transformation of Indian Agriculture: A Road map of Development

Transformation of agriculture entails structural changes in the growth pattern, production mix, inputs use and institutions serving the sector. The share of agriculture in national gross domestic product and labour force employed in agriculture declines and the production systems become more knowledge and technology intensive, with greater use of modern inputs. Within agriculture sector, share of high value and processed product increases and the system serving agriculture (markets and public services) are also replaced with well-organized, professional entities with greater participation of private sector. This transformation is a continuous process and Indian agriculture has come from a stage of subsistence to transition to a commercial agriculture, which began with the Green Revolution and subsequently reinforced by advancements in other sectors like livestock, horticulture, fisheries, etc. Indian agriculture now needs to reach where the North American and European agriculture is today in terms of technology penetration, production structure and market orientation. This is in consistent with global development processes but challenges and transformation pathways may vary (World Bank, 2008). In the present context, there is a need to focus much more on agriculture due to low agricultural growth (2.5 per cent per annum in the last four years) and agrarian distress in terms of low agricultural prices and farm incomes. Farmers’ suicides in some parts of India is another issue relating to agriculture. Low farm incomes led to farmers’ agitations in many states of India. Agriculture sector is already facing several problems relating to sustainability, stagnant yields, water logging, soil erosion, volatility in prices, natural calamities, and small size of the farms. Agricultural development is important for raising the incomes of population dependent on agriculture and growth of non-agricultural sector. There are significant linkages between farm and non-farm sectors. The theory of ‘imbalanced growth’ discusses sectoral linkages and also indicates that agriculture could not become a leading sector due to its weak backward linkages.