Performance of agriculture in orissa: intertemporal and spatial variations importance of agriculture

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CHAPTER - IV

Orissa is primarily an agrarian economy. Agriculture is the state's dominant sector with a contribution of nearly 30 per cent to the Net State Domestic Product (NSDP). About 73 per cent of total main workers are engaged in agriculture including 44.3 per cent cultivators and 28.7 per cent agricultural labourers (1991 census). Nearly 87 per cent of total population live in rural areas. Though the contribution of agriculture to NSDP has significantly declined from 67 per cent in 1951 to around 30 per cent in 1998, the percentage of workforce engaged in agriculture has remained somewhat unchanged with 73.8 per cent in 1960 and 73 per cent in 1990 (Table 4.1). This implies that there has been an overcrowding in agriculture without any perceptible increase in production. There has been a spectacular increase in disguised unemployment or underemployment in the agriculture sector with zero or near zero marginal productivity of agricultural labour. Cultivated land area remaining more or less fixed, with increase in population the land-man ratio has worsened over time. The per capita availability of cultivated land which was 0.39 ha. in 1950 has been drastically reduced to 0.17 ha. in 1999.

Over the last two to three decades there has been stagnation in agriculture in Orissa. The yearwise area, yield rate and production of food grains have been indicated for the period 1970-1998 in Table 4.2 and Figure 4.1. A careful analysis of the trend reveals that there has been a distinct increase in area, yield and production of foodgrains in the year 1983-84. The yield of foodgrains has increased from 883 kg/ha in 1970 to 956 kg/ha in 1983. Thereafter, there has been a distinct increase in yield rate in the year 1988 and this rate has more or less sustained till 1998.