Geographia Polonica (1979) vol. 40
Agricultural typology of India
Geographia Polonica (1979) vol. 40, pp. 113-132 | 
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Abstract
India has often been described as an area of subsistence agriculture. Great advances, however, have been made in the Indian agriculture in the post-inde-pendence period. The recent improvements as a consequence of land reforms, consolidation of holdings, provision of irrigational facilities, scientific advance-ments in agricultural researches, implements, use of fertilizers, manures and pesticides, have ushered the Green Revolution in large segment of the country increasing agricultural production by 62 per cent.
India covers an area of 3,267,500 km2 of which only 45 per cent is under plough, 20 per cent under irrigation and only 15 per cent under double crop-ping. Forests cover 17 per cent of the area. The cropping system is mainly food oriented as only 18 per cent of the cultivated area is devoted to commercial crops. Livestock, dairying and poultry is least developed on commercial scale. They exhibit a contrasting but inter-related physical, socio-cultural and econo-mic conditions. There are well established regional variations in agriculture, industry, irrigational and commercial activities. Large areas of tribal and other backward communities have not been affected by either the Green Revolution or by industrial, institutional and commercial activities. Only a micro level study in agricultural typology can reveal the homogeneity in agricultural attri-butes and also in the level of agriculture. This study has been undertaken at state level so that the results can be represented on the world map showing agricultural typology of India.
, Department of Geography, Bañaras Hindu University, Varanasi, India