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Unit 11: Sectoral Performance I: Agriculture: Growth Productivity Trends and Crop Patterns

record upto this time. Rice production touches 96 m. tonnes, wheat 78 m. tonnes, coarse cereals 41 m Notes
tonnes and pulse 15 m. tonnes. Oil seeds and cotton have also yielded higher production. It appears
that agriculture is turning the corner. There is a need to strengthen this process further.
After showing improvement in production of different crops, crops failure in different crops affected
all crops except rice in 2008-09.
International Comparison of Agricultural Productivity

It will be useful to make a comparison of year per hectare of some selected crops in India with in
other countries of the world so as to show much India lags behind the other countries of the world.
Table 10 shows :
(a) the actual yield per hectare of major food non-food crops in India in the year 1999;
(b) the actual yield in the country which is largest producer of each specific crop; and
(c) the highest yield per hectare in the world.
In the case of rice, the highest yield in the world nearly 94 quintals per hectare recorded by Egypt. In
case of wheat, the highest yield is recorded by England over 78 quintals per hectare.
China which is the single largest producer both rice and wheat in the world records with average
yields of 60 quintals and 39 quintals respectively.
Now, compare with average annual yield in India –only 30.0 quintals of rice and 26.2 quintals of
wheat. Rice is India’s major crop but the annual yield is only one-third of that of Egypt and a little less
than one-half of the annual yield of China.
Even in the case of wheat – the crop which has recorded the highest increase in India in the last
50 years – India’s average annual yield is much lower as compared to the U.K. (world’s highest yield
in wheat) and China (world’s largest producer of wheat).
In fact, when we compare carefully the average annual yield of every crop mentioned in Table 9, we
find that the average yield in India generally ranges between 30 and 50 per cent only of the highest
average yield in the world — this shows the enormous scope for, as well as challenge to, India to
increase its annual yield. This fact demonstrates clearly that the increase in yield recorded by India
under the green revolution and the introduction of modern technologies are not particularly unique
to India; in fact, it is much less in India than the increase recorded by other developing countries like
China.
For instance, against the actual yield of 30.0 quintals per hectare in rice, India has the potential to
produce between 40 and 58 quintals of rice per hectare. In the case of wheat, India can produce up to
60 to 68 quintals, but the average yield is around 26 quintals per hectare. Even if we assume that
India could register the minimum of the potential yield, the total output of rice in India should be 168
million tonnes per year (42 million hectares x 40 quintals or 4 tonnes per hectare); but the actual
production of rice ranged between 82 and 93 million tonnes in between 1997 and 2007. Likewise, the
total output of wheat in India should be 156 million tonnes (26 million hectares x 60 quintals or
6 tonnes per hectare); however, the actual production of wheat ranged between 69 and 75 million
tonnes between 1997 and 2007.
It would thus be clear that if India could achieve the minimum of potential yield of only these two
cereals, the total production would be around 324 million tonnes. It may be mentioned here that the
total production of all cereals and pulses came to 199 million tonnes in 1996-97 and 213 million
tonnes in 2006-07. The gap between the actual yield and potential yield in all our crops and the gap
between the average yield in India and the average yield in many other countries of the world —
these pose a challenge and an opportunity for India — vast scope for second and third green revolution.
Some agricultural economists have expressed their doubts about the possibility of India ever reaching
the levels of yield attained in cold countries. There is no doubt that some scope of increasing yield
exists, but to hope that it can be raised to 3 to 5 times is not feasible due to the fact that the semi-dwarf
HYV varieties of wheat in India have a duration of 140 days, while in the cold countries long duration
wheat crop of 10 months duration helps to obtain higher yields.

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