Agricultural Growth and Regional Convergence in India

Agriculture is one of the major sectors in India, providing more than half of the total workforce. The present study examines the regional growth and tendency of convergence in agricultural sectors, considering area, production and yield of the foodgrains. Covering 30 years of data from 1990-91 to 2019-20, the study has used standard compound annual growth rate formula and sigma convergence analysis. It is observed that for all the six regions, the majority of states have significant growth rates. Like the growth of area-wise food and non-foodgrains, the growth of production of various crop types of foodgrains and non-foodgrains for the majority of states is high in case of rice than the other crops. Further, the convergence test shows a similar tendency of convergence or divergence for the variables of area, production and estimates of yield of foodgrains and non-foodgrains. The area of total or all the types of foodgrains and non-foodgrains have constant and a tendency of convergence over time, but in terms of production and yield of foodgrains have high fluctuation and non-foodgrains items have more tendency of divergence than the foodgrains items.

Banalata Saikia*1 and Manuj Baruah2 Click here to download file

Research Article | Published online : 02-Oct-2023