ANALYSIS OF GROWTH AND CROPPING PATTERN CHANGES OF INDIAN AGRICULTURE SINCE INDEPENDENCE: CRITICAL ACCOUNT ON THE SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT PERSPECTIVES

Abstract

Agriculture, land use and food security are at the main subject of the debates in the 2015 development goals and targets. However, hunger and food insecurity remain major development priorities in the recent decades. Nevertheless, the existing agriculture, changes in land use patterns and food systems are critical to sustaining poor people’s life and livelihoods. The 2015 Sustainable Development goals and agendas need to support for more productive, environmentally sustainable and resilient while safeguarding and augmenting life and livelihood of the mass through agricultural sustainability. With this background, the present research paper attempted to analyze, the trend of the agricultural sector in terms of growth rates of area production, quantity production, yield of selected crops and its share to national income towards achieving food security towards zero hunger over the last seven decades since its Independence in India and examine the relative contribution of area yield, output changes in relation to other related variable like rainfall, fertilizers and land use pattern in India. The study findings indicate a notable trend in the agricultural sector: the proportion of agricultural imports within the realm of agricultural commodities saw a steady rise, climbing from 2.79 percent to 5.07 percent spanning the years from 1990-91 to 2021-22. Conversely, the proportion of agricultural commodity exports relative to the overall national export share experienced a gradual decline, diminishing from 18.47 percent to 11.94 percent over the same period. Moreover, data reveals significant growth in key agricultural metrics. The total cultivated area for food grain production expanded substantially, surging from 97.32 million hectares in 1950-51 to 129.34 million hectares by 2020-21. Concurrently, the quantity of food grain produced exhibited remarkable