Chapter 14: Agriculture – II: Food Crops
In the 1970s, in the years after the Green Revolution, a new crop began to spread across the irrigated fields of Punjab, in India’s north-west. The crop was rice — a plant that wants 150 to 300 cm of rain in a year and likes to stand in water while it grows. Punjab does not get that rain. The traditional grain belt of north-western India receives between 40 and 75 cm in a year. Rice arrived anyway, and it did not merely survive. Ninety-seven per cent of the rice area in Punjab is irrigated, and with high-yielding seed, fertiliser and machinery, the state now takes more rice from every hectare than any other state in India. Most of that rice is not eaten in Punjab. The bulk of it is exported. The water had to come from somewhere. Rice is mainly an irrigated crop, and in its early growth it needs 5 to 10 cm of standing water on the field. In Punjab, almost every one of those centimetres has to be supplied rather than received. Today the government of Punjab is asking its own farmers to shift away from rice altogether.
Graph
Fig. 14.A1 Caption: Each food crop in this chapter lives inside its own band of rainfall, and the bands barely overlap. Brief: Horizontal floating-bar chart; x-axis annual rainfall in cm from 0 to 300; y-axis the six crops — rice, wheat, jowar, bajra, ragi, pulses; one bar per crop drawn across its rainfall range, with wheat shown as a single mark at 80 cm and jowar as an open bar below 100 cm; data taken from Table 14.2 of this chapter.
14.1 Agricultural Seasons
In India the farming year is not one long stretch of work. It is cut into seasons, and different crops are sown in different ones. What makes the cut is not the farmer’s preference but the weather — the arrival of the rain-bearing South-West Monsoon in June, and the onset of winter a few months after it.
There are two major agricultural seasons in India, and a further set of crops raised in the months the two main seasons leave free. Together they give the country three named cropping seasons. (a) Kharif crops are the crops of the monsoon. They are sown in June and July, as the rains set in, and are harvested in the autumn months, that is, in September and October. Rice, jowar, bajra, ragi, maize, sugarcane, cotton and jute are the important kharif crops. (b) Rabi crops are the crops of the cold weather. The rabi season begins with the onset of winter in October and November and ends in March and April, and its low temperatures suit temperate and subtropical crops such as wheat, barley, peas, linseed, rapeseed, gram and mustard. (c) Zayad or zaid crops are raised through the year rather than in either main season, and they take two forms. (i) Zayad kharif crops are sown in August and September and harvested in December and January. Most of the oilseeds, such as mustard, are grown in this season. (ii) Zayad rabi crops are sown at the beginning of the hot season, in February and March, and are harvested in the months of April and May. Summer vegetables, jowar, maize, watermelons and cucumbers are important among these crops.
Where This Calendar Does Not Hold
This division of the year does not exist in southern India. There the temperatures stay sufficiently high to grow tropical crops during any period of the year, provided the soil moisture is available. What limits a crop in the south, then, is water rather than warmth, and a calendar built around the return of winter has little to say about it.
The sowing months, the harvesting months and the crops of all three seasons are set out together in Table 14.1.
How Much Land Food Crops Take
Indian agriculture is largely dominated by food crops. They occupy 65 per cent of the total cropped area of the country — the cropped area being the land actually sown with crops in a year — and they contribute about 50 per cent of the total value of agricultural production.
Those two figures are worth holding side by side. Food crops take about two-thirds of the sown land and return about half the value, so on average a hectare under food crops earns less than a hectare under the crops that are not food. Food crops are grown throughout the country, either as a sole crop in a field or in combination with other crops in the same field.
The Main Crops Of India
Before the food crops are taken one by one, it helps to see where they sit among everything else India grows. Fig. 14.1 sorts the country’s main crops into six groups.
Flowchart
Fig. 14.1 Caption: India’s main crops fall into six groups, and the food crops of this chapter sit in the first of them. Nodes: Main crops in India → cereals → wheat, rice, jowar, gram, bajra, ragi, pulses; main crops in India → oilseeds → linseed, groundnut, sesame, sunflower, rapeseed, mustard; main crops in India → plantations → coffee, rubber, tea; main crops in India → spices → pepper, ginger, turmeric, chillies, cloves, saffron; main crops in India → cash crops → sugarcane, tobacco; main crops in India → fibre crops → cotton, jute
Cereals, The Staple Group
India is by and large self-sufficient in food grains. The important food crops grown in India are rice, wheat, barley, maize, millets, which are jowar, bajra and ragi, and pulses, which include gram and tur. This chapter studies these food crops, and the main ones fall under the category of cereals.
The term cereals denotes all kinds of grass-like plants which have starchy, edible seeds. The most common cereals are rice, wheat, maize, barley, rye, oats and millets. Because of their simple form of cultivation and their high nutritional value, they have formed the basic diet of mankind.
India ranks third in the production of cereals in the world, after China and the USA. Cereals occupy about 54 per cent of the total cropped area in India and 11 per cent of the total production of cereals in the world.
Read that last pair of figures carefully, because they are not measured against the same thing. The 54 per cent is a share of India’s own sown land; the 11 per cent is a share of the world’s cereal output. One tells you how India uses its fields, the other tells you what India adds to the world’s grain, and neither figure can be used to judge the other.
14.2 Rice
Rice is the most important staple food crop of India — a staple being the grain a population eats every day and depends on for most of its food. It feeds more than half of our population and accounts for one-third of the production of food grains in the country. India is the second largest producer of rice in the world after China.
Rice is an indigenous crop, that is, one that has been grown here from very early times rather than brought in from outside. It is grown all over the country, with the highest concentration in the north-eastern and southern parts. It occupies above 43 million hectares of land, a hectare being an area of 10,000 square metres.
Rice is mainly a tropical crop. It requires a mean temperature of 24°C — a mean temperature is the average of the temperatures over a period, not the reading on any one day — and an annual rainfall of 150cm.
In north India rice is a kharif crop, sown with the monsoon and harvested in autumn. In the south it can be grown throughout the year if irrigation is available, because the warmth there never runs out.
14.2.1 Climatic Conditions
Temperature
Rice cultivation is conditioned by temperature differences at different phases of growth. The plant does not want one temperature throughout; it wants a different one at each stage, and it grows best in warm and humid areas.
The critical mean temperature for flowering and fertilisation ranges from 16°C to 20°C, whereas during ripening the range is from 18°C to 32°C. Temperatures beyond 35°C affect not only grain retention but also grain-filling, which is the stage when the seed itself is filling out.
Rice requires ample sunshine and water. It can grow at different altitudes as long as its temperature requirements are satisfied, and this is worth pausing on, because the air cools as you climb. What decides the crop is therefore not the height itself but whether the temperature at that height stays inside the range the plant needs.
Two places make the point. Rice is grown in Kashmir, in the far north of the country, at a height of 2000m, and it is also grown in the Kuttanad region of Kerala, on the south-western coast, which lies below sea-level.
Rainfall
Rice requires good rainfall, in the range of 150 to 300cm. In fact, rice is mainly an irrigated crop. It requires much water both in and upon the soil — in the soil for the roots to draw on, and upon it as a sheet of standing water lying over the field.
During the earlier phase of its growth, rice requires 5 to 10cm of standing water. Therefore the monsoon lands are best suited for rice production, as heavy irrigation is required. Deltas, estuaries, flood plains and valleys of rivers, and coastal plains with heavy soils, provide excellent conditions for the cultivation of rice.
14.2.2 Soil
Deep fertile clayey or loamy soils are well suited for rice cultivation. Rice thrives in the alluvial soils along the river banks — alluvium is the fine material a river carries and drops when it slows.
The soil should be able to retain standing water in the field, and clay does this because its particles are very fine and pack tightly, letting water through only slowly. This phenomenon protects the plants from pests which cannot survive under water.
Standing water, then, is doing two jobs at once in a rice field: it feeds the plant and it drowns the plant’s enemies. Soils need manure and fertilisers to produce a higher yield.
14.2.3 Upland And Lowland Rice
The rice crops in India can be grouped into two categories, upland rice and lowland rice, and the difference between them is a difference of land, water and purpose.
The upland crop is grown on mountainous regions, and four things follow from that. (a) It is sown in March-April and harvested in September-October. (b) This type of rice cultivation depends on the distribution of rainfall only, since there is no irrigation to fall back on. (c) The crop must therefore take whatever the rain gives it, in the amount and at the time the rain gives it. (d) The entire crop is used locally.
The lowland crop is grown on low-lying regions, where water can be held on the field. (a) It is sown in June and harvested in October. (b) This type of rice requires plenty of water during the sowing and harvesting period. (c) The produce is used for local consumption as well as supplied to other regions.
The two therefore differ in more than height. Upland rice depends on rainfall alone and feeds the people who grow it, while lowland rice is fed with plenty of water and produces enough to travel beyond the village.
Diagram
Fig. 14.2 Caption: Upland rice cultivation on a hill slope, where the crop lives on rainfall alone. Brief: Source a photograph of upland rice being cultivated on terraced or sloping hill land; label the sloping ground and the narrow water channel; emphasise that the water is running, not standing.
14.2.4 Methods Of Cultivation
In India, rice is cultivated by two methods, the dry method and the puddled method, and which one a farmer uses is decided by how much water he can count on.
The dry method of cultivation is mainly confined to areas which depend on rains and do not have supplementary irrigation facilities. In this method, the seeds are sown in rows with the help of drills in heavy rainfall areas, and are scattered with hands in areas of moderate rainfall.
The puddled method, also called the wet method, is practised in areas which have an assured and adequate supply of water. In this method, the land is ploughed thoroughly and filled with three to five centimetres of standing water in the field. This water is maintained in the fields up to a depth of two to three centimetres till the seedlings are well established.
The steps followed for cultivating rice are the same whichever method is used. (a) Sowing of seeds. (b) Transplanting. (c) Harvesting. (d) Processing.
Flowchart
Fig. 14.A2 Caption: Rice moves through four stages, and the first of them can be done in three different ways. Nodes: sowing of seeds → broadcasting / drilling / dibbling → transplanting → harvesting → processing
14.2.5 Sowing Of Seeds
Rice is sown in India in three ways, and each suits a different combination of labour, soil and equipment. (a) Broadcasting is a method in which the seeds are scattered all over the field after ploughing it, before the onset of monsoon. It is prevalent in those regions where labour is scarce and the soil is infertile, and because usually inferior quality seeds are sown in this way, the yield is low. (b) Drilling is followed in Peninsular India, the plateau region south of the Northern Plains. Seeds are sown in the furrows with the help of a drill normally made of bamboo, so the seeds fall in the furrows in a systematic way, the germination rate is high and the wastage of seeds is minimal; however, this method is time consuming. (c) Dibbling is a method of cultivation that uses a tool called a dibber, a simple pointed stick, to help plant a seed by creating a hole in the ground. The seeds are planted at regular intervals in the furrows by hand, and since it is usually done when the soil is wet, it is used in conjunction with puddling.
14.2.6 Transplanting
Transplanting is common in the deltaic and flood plain regions and requires an abundance of labour, because every seedling is moved by hand.
Here seedlings are first grown in nurseries, and after four to five weeks, when the saplings attain 25-30cm of height, they are transplanted into prepared rice fields in groups of four to six at a distance of 30-45cm.
In the beginning, the field is flooded with a 2-3cm deep water. Subsequently, the depth of the water level is increased to 4-6cm till the crop matures. This method of rice cultivation is popular because it gives a higher yield.
The advantages of the transplanting method are four. (a) Only the healthy plants are picked for resowing in the field, and unhealthy plants are discarded. (b) Weeds are removed while resowing. (c) There is less wastage of seeds as compared to the broadcasting method. (d) This method gives a higher yield.
Diagram
Fig. 14.3 Caption: Seedlings raised in a nursery are moved by hand into a flooded field. Brief: Source a photograph of transplantation in a flooded rice field; label the bundles of seedlings and the standing water; emphasise the number of workers bent over one small area, showing how labour-intensive the method is.
The Japanese Method
The Japanese method is an improved form of the transplantation method. It was introduced in 1953 and has gained wide popularity in recent years. In this method, high yielding varieties of seeds, called ‘Japonica’, are used.
The method includes the following practices. (a) As in the previous method, the seedlings are prepared in the nurseries. (b) The rows of plants are fixed at a distance of 25cm, and the distance between the plants is about 15cm, so it is easy for the farmer to give proper care to the plants by weeding them. (c) Manure is used extensively to increase the yield. (d) The Japonica seeds give a higher yield in this method.
The fixed spacing is the quiet innovation here. A field planted at 25cm and 15cm is a field a person can walk into and work in, which is what makes regular weeding possible at all.
14.2.7 Harvesting And Processing
The fields are drained dry just before the crop is harvested, because a standing crop cannot be cut in water. The traditional cutting of the stalk is simple: a sickle, which is a curved knife, is used for this purpose.
Harvesting is labour intensive, as each stalk is hand-reaped. Each stem is cut about 60cm below the grain to facilitate threshing, so that there is enough stalk to hold and to beat. The moisture content of the crop is then reduced by drying the stalks in the sun.
Threshing
Threshing is done by beating the sheaves against wooden bars, and the grains are separated from the stalks. Threshing is done in the rice fields in order to minimise the cost of transportation, since it is cheaper to carry away grain alone than grain still attached to straw.
Winnowing
Winnowing is the process of removing the unwanted husk from the grains. The simple method involves pouring the grains from a height on a windy day: the heavier grains fall to the ground while the light chaff is blown aside.
Milling
Milling is done to remove the yellowish husk from the grains. The traditional method of removing the outer husk is by parboiling the grains and then drying them before removing the outer cover.
The farmer used to hit the grain in a wooden mortar with a heavy pestle, and this resulted in a high percentage of broken rice. Modern milling is done by machines.
Such polished rice has a glossy texture, but lacks nutrition, as most of its nutrients are lost due to excessive rubbing. After this, the polished rice is graded and stored in sacks. The shine on a bag of rice, in other words, has been bought at the cost of some of its food value.
Flowchart
Fig. 14.A3 Caption: From the standing crop to the sack, each step removes something the grain does not need. Nodes: drain the field → cut the stalk with a sickle, 60cm below the grain → dry the stalks in the sun → threshing, grain separated from stalk → winnowing, chaff blown aside → milling, husk removed → grading → stored in sacks
14.2.8 Distribution
India is the second largest producer of rice in the world. West Bengal, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu are the leading producers of rice in the country.
The other rice producing states are Haryana, Odisha, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Bihar, Assam, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Kerala, Gujarat and Telangana. Besides these states, Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Meghalaya, Manipur, Tripura, Arunachal Pradesh, Goa and Mizoram also produce rice. Map 14.1 shows where the major areas lie.
Map
Map 14.1 Caption: Rice producing areas of India, showing major areas and other areas. Brief: Outline map of India showing the full extent of India as officially defined, with state boundaries; two tints in the key, major areas and other areas; scale 1:24,000,000; label the Arabian Sea, Bay of Bengal, Indian Ocean, Andaman Sea, Lakshadweep Sea and the Tropic of Cancer; no production figures to be shown.
West Bengal
Rice is the leading crop of West Bengal, occupying about three-fourth of its cropped area. In West Bengal, farmers grow three crops of rice, called ‘Aus’, ‘Aaman’ and ‘Boro’.
Only the Aaman crop sits squarely inside the months of the South-West Monsoon. Aus is sown before the rains arrive and Boro grows right through the dry winter months, so neither can be fed by the monsoon alone. Three crops a year, then, are not a measure of how much rain West Bengal gets; they are a measure of how much water can be brought to the field when the sky is not supplying it, and of how much labour is available to plant and cut three times over.
Uttar Pradesh
Uttar Pradesh has the largest area under rice cultivation. Rice is an important crop in the eastern region of the state, which accounts for 45 per cent of it.
Basti, Gorakhpur, Deoria, Siddharth Nagar, Maharajganj, Gonda and Azamgarh come under the 100 leading rice producing districts in the country.
Andhra Pradesh
Rice occupies about one-third of the total cropped area of Andhra Pradesh. Although the crop is grown throughout the state, five districts — West Godavari (Bheemavaram), Krishna (Machilipatnam), East Godavari (Rajamahendravaram), Kurnool and Guntur — together contribute more than half of the state’s rice production.
The other rice producing districts are Anantapur, Srikakulam, Visakhapatnam, Nellore and Cuddapah. That five districts out of many carry more than half the output is a reminder that a state figure is an average laid over very unequal ground.
Punjab
Rice cultivation in the irrigated areas of Punjab was introduced in the 1970s following the Green Revolution. Here 97 per cent of the rice area is irrigated, and due to the higher input of High Yielding Variety seeds, fertilisers and mechanisation, the per hectare yield is the highest in the country.
Amritsar, Faridkot, Jalandhar and Patiala are the main rice producing areas in Punjab, and the bulk of the rice grown is exported.
Tamil Nadu
Tamil Nadu is an important producer of rice. Here about 75 per cent of the produce is contributed by Tanjavur, South Arcot, Chingleput, North Arcot and Madurai.
14.3 Wheat
Wheat is the second most important food crop in the country after rice, both in area and in production. About 14 per cent of the total cropped area in the country is under wheat cultivation.
India accounts for about 12 per cent of the total wheat production of the world and ranks second after China in wheat production. The progress in wheat cultivation since 1967-68 has made India self-sufficient in food grains.
Wheat forms the staple food for people in the northern and north-western parts of the country. Where rice divides the year in the east and the south, wheat is the grain of the cold weather in the north.
Diagram
Fig. 14.4 Caption: A combine harvester at work in a ripe wheat field. Brief: Source a photograph of mechanised wheat harvesting; label the harvester and the standing ripe crop; emphasise the flat, open field and the dry, warm look of the ripened grain.
14.3.1 Climatic Conditions
Climate
Wheat can be grown in varying conditions of climate and soil. However, it is mostly confined to the regions of cool winters. It grows best in a cool, moist climate and ripens in a warm, dry climate.
That single sentence carries the whole geography of wheat. The plant wants one climate while it is growing and a different one while it is ripening, so it needs a place where the year moves from cool and damp to warm and dry — which is exactly what a north Indian winter does as it gives way to spring.
Wheat is sown usually in October and the sowing continues till the middle of November. However, in the south its growing period is shorter than in the north. It is harvested by the end of January in the south, and by March or April in Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Western UP, Rajasthan, Punjab and Haryana.
Temperature
Wheat, being a rabi crop, is sown just before winter. Ideally, a temperature in the range of 10–15°C is suitable for sowing, and 20-25°C during harvest.
In India wheat is mostly grown in the Northern Plains during the cold weather season. The winter rain occurring in northern India is beneficial for this crop. UP, Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan and Bihar all grow wheat as a winter crop.
High heat and excessive rainfall is unsuitable for wheat. That is why it is not cultivated in West Bengal and the extreme south.
Rainfall
About 80cm of annual rainfall is ideal for wheat cultivation. The traditional wheat growing region of north-western India receives an annual rainfall of 40 to 75cm, which is less than the ideal.
Here about 12.5cm of rainfall in the winter months of January and February is good for grain filling and increased yields. While the shortage of rainfall may be made up by irrigation, excess of moisture retards the plant growth.
14.3.2 Soil
Wheat grows best in well-drained loams and clay loams, that is, soils that hold moisture but let the surplus drain away rather than lie on top. During germination the plant needs sufficient soil moisture.
Three kinds of wheat are grown on three different soils in India. Most of the common bread wheat, triticum aestivum, is grown on the alluvial soils of the Northern Plains. Macaroni wheat, triticum durum, is grown on the black soils of the central and southern parts of India, while triticum dicoccum grows on the red soils of the Nilgiri Hills, in the south of the country. Map 14.2 shows where the crop as a whole is concentrated.
Map
Map 14.2 Caption: Wheat producing areas of India, showing major areas and other areas. Brief: Outline map of India showing the full extent of India as officially defined, with state boundaries; two tints in the key, major areas and other areas; scale 1:24,000,000; label the Arabian Sea, Bay of Bengal, Indian Ocean, Andaman Sea, Lakshadweep Sea and the Tropic of Cancer; no production figures to be shown.
14.3.3 Methods Of Cultivation
Sowing
Wheat requires a well-pulverised but compact seed-bed for good germination — pulverised meaning broken down into fine crumbs, so that a small seed sits in close contact with the soil around it. The fields are ploughed and pulverised several times before the seed is sown.
The seeds can be sown by using the drilling or the broadcasting method, both of which were described for rice in section 14.2.5. The seeds germinate in about three or four days.
When the plant is about 15cm to 20cm tall, it needs good irrigation if it does not rain in time. The temperature should be generally low in the growing season. For the development of grain, a gradual increase in temperature is more suitable than a fast increase. The plant needs three or four times irrigation during the growing period.
Harvesting
The wheat crop starts ripening in the month of March, when the temperature is about 21°C, and is harvested in April when the temperature is about 27.5°C. Wheat is mostly harvested using a sickle.
However, machines have replaced the sickles in Punjab, Haryana and western UP. The traditional method of threshing, in which the crop was trampled under the bullock’s feet to separate the grain from the husk, is now done by threshers, as the former is time-consuming.
No other crop in India has registered such a sharp increase in its production like wheat. On an average, wheat accounts for 26 per cent of the total area under cereals and 14 per cent of the total cropped area in the country.
The rise of temperature through the season is not an inconvenience the crop puts up with. Fig. 14.A4 sets out the wheat year, and the numbers along it show the warmth climbing steadily from sowing to harvest.
Flowchart
Fig. 14.A4 Caption: The wheat year runs from a cool sowing to a warm harvest, and the crop needs the change to be gradual. Nodes: sowing in October to mid-November at 10–15°C → germination in three or four days → plant 15–20cm tall, irrigation if the rain fails → winter rain in January and February, grain filling → ripening in March at about 21°C → harvest in April at about 27.5°C, 20-25°C being the ideal harvest range
14.3.4 Distribution
Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh are the five leading producers of wheat in the country. The yield of wheat is high in Punjab and Haryana and moderate in Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Bihar.
In Madhya Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir, wheat is grown under rainfed conditions and, therefore, the yield is low.
Leading in production and leading in yield are two different things, and Madhya Pradesh shows why. It is among the five largest producers because a great deal of land there is under wheat, yet its rainfed fields give a low yield per hectare, because the water arrives when the sky sends it rather than when the crop asks for it.
14.4 Millets
The term millets refers to a number of grains that the grain trade has long graded as inferior — jowar, also called cholam, bajra, also called cumbu, and ragi — and which serve as food grains for the poorer sections of the society. The straw, that is, the dry stalk left after the grain is taken, makes a valuable cattle fodder.
The word inferior there describes the price and the standing of these grains in the market, and nothing else. It certainly does not describe what is in them.
Millets are highly nutritious and easily digestible food. They are a rich source of iron, calcium, zinc and magnesium, and India is the largest producer of millets like bajra.
They are grown under conditions where the soil is rather infertile owing to its rocky or sandy character. These are crops of short duration, from three to four months, and that shortness is itself a survival strategy: a plant that finishes in three months needs the rain to hold for three months only.
14.4.1 Jowar
Ranking next to rice and wheat in both area and production, jowar or great millet is one of the most important food crops in India. It accounts for 5.3 per cent of the total cropped area.
In the dry parts of the Peninsular Plateau, where rice or wheat cannot be grown, jowar occupies large tracts and forms the staple food for a large section of the population. It is also grown mainly for fodder in many parts of the country.
14.4.1.1 Climatic Conditions
Jowar is both a kharif and a rabi crop, which is unusual and tells you how tolerant it is. It grows well even in the dry farming areas, that is, in areas farmed on rainfall alone, mostly without irrigation support.
Although most of the crop is grown on the plains, it can be raised successfully on gentle slopes up to 1,200m height.
Jowar grows well at a temperature between 27°C and 32°C at the time of germination, but it cannot be grown when the temperature is below 16°C.
Jowar can be grown in arid and semi-arid areas having rainfall under 45cm. However, its concentration is more in regions having less than 100cm of rainfall.
Diagram
Fig. 14.5 Caption: A jowar field, the earheads standing well clear of the leaves. Brief: Source a photograph of a ripening jowar crop in the field; label the earhead and the tall stalk; emphasise the dry, open look of the ground between the plants.
14.4.1.2 Soil
Jowar can grow on a variety of soils ranging from heavy and light alluvium to red, grey and yellow loams. It can even grow on sandy soils.
The black clayey loams of the Peninsular Plateau are considered to be most ideal for jowar cultivation, and this matters where irrigation is absent, because those soils hold moisture between one shower and the next.
14.4.1.3 Methods Of Cultivation
Jowar does not require as thorough and prolonged a preparation of the fields as in the case of rice or wheat. However, the soil management before sowing plays an important role in the dry farming areas, where every drop the soil can be made to hold has to be held.
The seeds are mostly sown using the broadcast method, but they are also dibbled in some areas. The crop matures in about four to five months.
14.4.1.4 Distribution
Jowar or sorghum accounts for about 5.3 per cent of the total cropped area in the country. Jowar is largely grown in Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.
These states account for about 80 per cent of the total production of jowar in the country. The remaining production comes from Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat and Rajasthan. Map 14.3 shows the areas of all three millets together.
Map
Map 14.3 Caption: Jowar, bajra and ragi producing areas of India. Brief: Outline map of India showing the full extent of India as officially defined, with state boundaries; three distinct hatchings in the key for jowar, bajra and ragi, drawn so that overlapping areas stay legible; scale 1:24,000,000; label the Arabian Sea, Bay of Bengal, Indian Ocean, Andaman Sea, Lakshadweep Sea and the Tropic of Cancer.
14.4.2 Bajra
Bajra or bulrush millet is an important millet crop. Most of it is used as staple food in north-western Rajasthan and Gujarat. The plant stalks are fed to cattle or used for thatching purposes, so almost nothing of the crop is wasted.
14.4.2.1 Climatic Conditions
Bajra is a short season kharif crop. It is grown either as a pure or a mixed crop — a mixed crop being one raised in the same field alongside another crop — and as a mixed crop it is grown with cotton, jowar or ragi.
It is also a rainfed kharif crop and is seldom irrigated. The ideal temperature for its growth is between 25°C to 30°C.
Bajra is suited to areas of low rainfall and can be grown even in tracts which receive less than 50cm of rainfall. It is seldom grown in areas where rainfall exceeds 100cm.
Light monsoon showers followed by bright sunshine provide the most suitable weather conditions in the early stages of growth. The showers wet the soil and the sunshine that follows lets the young plant use that moisture rather than sit in it.
14.4.2.2 Soil
Bajra can be grown on a wide range of soils. But it grows best in black cotton soils and sandy loams with good drainage, since a soil that drains freely suits a plant that dislikes standing wet.
Diagram
Fig. 14.6 Caption: A bajra field, with the grain carried in a tight spike at the top of each stalk. Brief: Source a photograph of a bajra crop in the field; label the cylindrical spike and the stalk; emphasise the light, sandy soil visible at the base of the plants.
14.4.2.3 Distribution
Bajra is a short season kharif crop in north India. In some southern parts it is grown in summer with irrigation.
With the exception of jowar, bajra occupies more area than any other millet crop in the country. The principal bajra growing states are Rajasthan, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana.
As it is a rainfed crop, its productivity fluctuates from year to year. A field with no irrigation behind it has no defence against a weak monsoon, so the same land can give a good harvest one year and a poor one the next.
14.4.3 Ragi
Ragi or buckwheat is an important millet which is grown in the drier parts of south India and in some areas of northern India.
14.4.3.1 Climatic Conditions
The temperature requirement of ragi varies from 20°C to 30°C.
Ragi is one of the hardiest crops. It can grow under conditions of very low rainfall and can withstand very severe drought. It is widely grown in areas where the average annual rainfall is 50cm to 100cm.
14.4.3.2 Soil
Ragi is grown mainly in areas of dry farming. It is raised on red, light black and sandy loams in Karnataka and Tamil Nadu, and on the well-drained alluvial loams of Uttarakhand, Jharkhand and Gujarat.
The yield of ragi is lower than wheat and rice but appreciably higher than most other millets, including jowar and bajra. This is because ragi needs lower inputs and attention than most other food crops.
14.4.3.3 Methods Of Cultivation
Ragi is a kharif crop, sown between May and August and harvested between September and January. In many parts of South India it is cultivated throughout the year with the help of irrigation.
The seeds are sown by the broadcast method or with the help of drills, and are even transplanted on well-prepared friable beds, a friable bed being soil worked loose enough to crumble easily. The crop requires three to five months to mature.
14.4.3.4 Distribution
Ragi occupies 1.3 per cent of the total cropped area and 5 per cent of the total cereals. Karnataka is the leading producer of ragi in the country, followed by Tamil Nadu, Uttarakhand, Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh.
The other ragi producing states are Uttarakhand, Odisha, Jharkhand, Rajasthan and Gujarat.
Diagram
Fig. 14.7 Caption: A ragi crop, the grain held in finger-like heads at the tip of the stalk. Brief: Source a photograph of a standing ragi crop; label the finger-like earhead; emphasise the dry farming ground on which it is growing.
The Three Millets Together
The three millets are not interchangeable. Each sits in its own band of rainfall and its own preferred soil, and Fig. 14.A5 sets the three side by side.
Flowchart
Fig. 14.A5 Caption: The three millets of this chapter, sorted by the conditions each one is built for. Nodes: millets → jowar → both kharif and rabi; black clayey loams of the Peninsular Plateau; mostly under 100cm of rainfall; millets → bajra → short season kharif; black cotton soils and well-drained sandy loams; can manage under 50cm of rainfall; millets → ragi → kharif; red, light black and sandy loams; hardiest of the three, 50cm to 100cm of rainfall
Table 14.2 now brings the whole set of food crops together — the two cereals of the previous sections, the three millets of this one, and the pulses that follow.
14.5 Pulses
Pulses form a very important part of the Indian diet, especially for those who consume a starchy vegetarian diet. This is because pulses provide vegetable protein, which a diet built on cereals alone is short of.
Pulses are leguminous crops, that is, pod-bearing plants that fix atmospheric nitrogen in the soil. To fix nitrogen is to take it from the air and leave it in the soil in a form the next plant can use, and it increases the natural fertility of the soil.
Hence, pulses are usually rotated with other crops to maintain or restore soil fertility. Crop rotation means growing different crops in the same field one after another, in a planned order, rather than the same crop season after season.
Flowchart
Fig. 14.A6 Caption: A pulse crop in the rotation returns to the soil some of what the last crop took out. Nodes: field sown with a cereal or other crop → the crop draws on the fertility of the soil → soil fertility falls → pulses sown in the same field → pulses fix atmospheric nitrogen in the soil → natural fertility of the soil is restored → back to the next crop in the rotation
Pulse crops include a large number of crops, which are mostly leguminous and rich in proteins. Pulses also serve as an excellent forage and as grain concentrates in the feed of cattle, so a single crop feeds both the household and its animals.
Gram and arhar or tur, which is the pigeon-pea or red gram, are the most important pulses. Others like urad (black gram), moong (green gram), masur (lentil), kulthi (horse gram), matar (peas), khesari or lakh, and moth or matki are also grown.
14.5.1 Climatic Conditions
The temperature suited to pulses is 20°C to 25°C, and the rainfall 50 to 75cm.
Set beside the 150 to 300cm that rice asks for, that is a modest demand, and it places pulses among the crops of the drier and less watered land rather than among the crops of the deltas.
14.5.2 Soil
Dry light soil is required for the cultivation of pulses. Gram is the leading pulse crop, which occupies about two-fifths of the total area under all pulses.
Gram, also called Bengal gram, is raised as a rabi crop in those areas which receive about 10cm of rainfall during winter. Sometimes, gram is sown mixed with wheat. It is the crop of North and Central India.
Tur, urad and moong are raised as kharif crops almost throughout India, while khesari and masur are raised as rabi crops in north India. Between them, then, the pulses fill both of the main cropping seasons.
14.5.3 Distribution
India is the largest producer and consumer of pulses and accounts for about one-fifth of the total production of pulses in the world. Pulses occupy about 11 per cent of the total cropped area in India.
Pulses are raised on soils ranging from light loams and alluvial soil of the Northern Plains to the black soils of Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra, and red soils elsewhere. They are mostly cultivated under rainfed conditions, but in some areas irrigation is provided.
The top five pulses producing states are Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Andhra Pradesh.
Diagram
Fig. 14.8 Caption: Some of the many pulses grown and eaten in India. Brief: Source a photograph showing several kinds of whole and split pulses in separate bowls; label three or four of them by name; emphasise the range of size and colour across the group.
How Much Land One Pulse Takes
Two figures in this section can be put together to find out how much of India’s cropped land carries a single crop, gram.
That 4.4 per cent is worth comparing with the figures from earlier sections. Jowar accounts for 5.3 per cent of the total cropped area and ragi for 1.3 per cent, so one pulse crop occupies more Indian farmland than ragi and almost as much as jowar. The result is only as good as the two figures behind it, both of which the chapter gives as approximations, so it should be read as a share of about four to five per cent rather than as an exact 4.4.
14.6 Summary
- India’s cropping year is cut into seasons by the weather, and different crops are sown in different ones.
- Kharif crops are the crops of the South-West Monsoon, sown in June and July and harvested in September and October.
- Rabi crops are the crops of the cold weather, sown from October and November and harvested in March and April.
- Zayad or zaid crops are raised outside the two main seasons, the zayad kharif from August-September to December-January and the zayad rabi from February-March to April-May.
- This division does not exist in southern India, where temperatures stay high enough all year to grow tropical crops provided soil moisture is available.
- Indian agriculture is dominated by food crops, which occupy 65 per cent of the total cropped area and contribute about 50 per cent of the value of agricultural production.
- The main crops of India fall into six groups — cereals, oilseeds, plantations, spices, cash crops and fibre crops — and the food crops of this chapter belong to the first.
- Cereals are grass-like plants with starchy, edible seeds. India ranks third in world cereal production after China and the USA, and cereals occupy about 54 per cent of the total cropped area in India.
- Rice is the most important staple food crop of India, feeding more than half the population and accounting for one-third of food grain production, on above 43 million hectares of land.
- It is mainly a tropical crop needing a mean temperature of 24°C and an annual rainfall of 150cm, with 150 to 300cm the working range.
- Flowering and fertilisation need 16°C to 20°C and ripening 18°C to 32°C, while temperatures beyond 35°C affect grain retention and grain-filling.
- It needs 5 to 10cm of standing water in its early growth, so deltas, estuaries, flood plains and coastal plains with heavy soils suit it best.
- It grows on deep fertile clayey or loamy soils and thrives on the alluvial soils along river banks.
- Rice is grown as upland rice on mountainous regions, on rainfall alone and for local use, while lowland rice is grown on low-lying land with plenty of water and travels beyond the village.
- Rice is cultivated by the dry method where farmers depend on rain, and by the puddled or wet method where the water supply is assured, and it passes through four stages.
- Sowing is done by broadcasting, drilling or dibbling.
- Transplanting moves nursery seedlings of 25-30cm into a flooded field, and the Japanese method, introduced in 1953, is its improved form using ‘Japonica’ seeds.
- Harvesting is done with a sickle, each stem cut about 60cm below the grain.
- Processing runs from threshing to winnowing to milling, after which the polished rice is graded and stored.
- India is the second largest producer of rice after China, with West Bengal, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu leading, and Punjab getting the highest per hectare yield because 97 per cent of its rice area is irrigated.
- Wheat is the second most important food crop, on about 14 per cent of the cropped area, and India ranks second after China in wheat production.
- It grows best in a cool, moist climate and ripens in a warm, dry one, so it is confined to regions of cool winters.
- Sowing needs 10–15°C and harvest 20-25°C, and about 80cm of annual rainfall is ideal.
- High heat and excessive rainfall are unsuitable, which is why it is not cultivated in West Bengal and the extreme south.
- Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh are the five leading producers.
- Millets are grains graded as inferior in the market but highly nutritious and easily digestible, rich in iron, calcium, zinc and magnesium, and grown on rather infertile rocky or sandy soils in three to four months.
- Jowar accounts for 5.3 per cent of the cropped area and holds the dry parts of the Peninsular Plateau, where rice and wheat cannot be grown.
- Bajra is a short season kharif crop that manages on less than 50cm of rainfall and is seldom irrigated.
- Ragi is the hardiest of the three, withstanding severe drought and growing where the average annual rainfall is 50cm to 100cm.
- The United Nations General Assembly declared 2023 the International Year of Millets.
- Pulses supply vegetable protein and, being leguminous, fix atmospheric nitrogen in the soil, so they are rotated with other crops to maintain or restore fertility.
- They need 20°C to 25°C, 50 to 75cm of rainfall and dry light soil, and are mostly grown under rainfed conditions.
- Gram is the leading pulse crop, occupying about two-fifths of the total area under all pulses.
- India is the largest producer and consumer of pulses, with about one-fifth of world production, on about 11 per cent of the total cropped area.
Flowchart
Fig. 14.A7 Caption: The food crops of this chapter, sorted by the water each one needs and the season it belongs to. Nodes: food crops of India → cereals → rice, kharif in the north, 150 to 300cm, clayey, loamy and alluvial soils / wheat, rabi, about 80cm, well-drained loams and clay loams / millets → jowar, kharif and rabi, mostly under 100cm, black clayey loams / bajra, short season kharif, under 50cm, sandy loams and black cotton soils / ragi, kharif, 50 to 100cm, red, light black and sandy loams; food crops of India → pulses, kharif and rabi, 50 to 75cm, dry light soil, and they return nitrogen to the field
What This Chapter Cannot Tell You
The chapter gives shares of cropped area and lists of leading states, but almost no production quantities and no yields, so it cannot tell you how much grain any state actually harvests, or how far ahead of the next one it is. Most of its figures carry no year, which matters for a subject where a single weak monsoon changes the answer.
The temperature and rainfall ranges describe what a crop will tolerate, not what any particular field received in a given season. The three crop maps are drawn at 1:24,000,000 with two or three classes and no numbers, so a single tint covers a whole district’s good land and poor land alike, and says nothing about the village inside it. ## 14.7 Check Your Concepts
- A district receives about 60cm of rainfall in a year. Using Table 14.2, name two food crops that could be grown there and one that could not, quoting the rainfall figure given for each of the three.
- A farmer sows a pulse crop in a field where he intends to grow a cereal in the following season. Explain what the pulse crop does to the soil while it grows, and why this makes the practice worth following.
- The chapter states that wheat accounts for 26 per cent of the total area under cereals and 14 per cent of the total cropped area of the country.
- Use these two figures to work out what share of India’s total cropped area is under cereals.
- Compare your answer with the figure the chapter gives for the share of cropped area under cereals.
- Map 14.3 shows the areas in which jowar, bajra and ragi are grown, but it carries no numbers of any kind.
- State two things about millet farming in India that this map cannot tell you.
- Name one table or figure elsewhere in the chapter that supplies one of them.
- Give a geographical reason for each of the following:
- Wheat cultivation is confined to the northern parts of the country.
- Punjab is the leading producer of wheat in India.
- The Government of India is encouraging the cultivation of millets.
- Give three differences between the climatic conditions needed for wheat cultivation and those needed for rice cultivation.
- In the year 2023-24 the government imposed restrictions on rice exports, according to news reports. As a student of geography, give reasons to support the government’s decision. [Hint: low rainfall in August 2023]
- On an outline map of India, shade and mark:
- The highest wheat producing state in India.
- Any two rice producing states in South India.
- One ragi producing region.
- Two major areas for the cultivation of pulses.
- You live in a state which has a number of rivers, deltas and estuaries, good rainfall and heavy soils. Which cereal crop is ideal for growth in your state? During which season would this crop be sown, and which method of cultivation would be used?
14.8 Case-Based Questions
- Study Fig. 14.9 and answer the following questions:
Diagram
Fig. 14.9 Caption: Seedlings being planted by hand in a field under water. Brief: Source a photograph of workers planting rice seedlings in a flooded field; label the bundles of seedlings and the water lying on the field; emphasise that the plants are being set in by hand, one small group at a time.
- Name the crop which is being planted, and give one benefit of this method of planting it.
- Name the other method of planting this crop, and state in which area that method is practised.
- Give a geographical reason for each of the following:
- Rice is not the main crop in the Deccan Plateau.
- Punjab is the largest producer of rice despite deficient rainfall.
- Wheat grows well in loamy soil.
- Mention the climatic conditions which favour the cultivation of the crop being planted.