Q. Critically examine the role of the Green Revolution in the development of agriculture in India.
Answer: The “Green Revolution” is a strategy for raising agricultural output through the
use of high yielding variety seeds combined with the use of fertilisers and other
chemical inputs that started in the 1960s. It was initiated by Norman Borlaug,
which led to his winning the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970 for his work in
developing High Yielding Varieties (HYVs) of wheat. Its introduction in India is
attributed to geneticist Dr. M. S. Swaminathan.
“If agriculture goes wrong, nothing else will have a chance to go right in our
country.”
– M. S Swaminathan
BACKGROUND
• When India became independent in 1947, 90% of its population lived in
600,000 villages depending mainly on agriculture for their livelihood.
• However, Indian agriculture remained unchanged without any
technological changes in agricultural practices and involved wooden
ploughs, waterwheels, and bullock carts etc.
• Industries saw a negative growth as the agriculture sector failed to meet
the demands.
• The lack of proper technological change and land reforms combined
with droughts brought India to the verge of massive famine in the mid1960s.
• As a result, India had to import food grains, mainly wheat, from the USA
to avert the crisis. This in turn depleted the reserves of the nation.
• So, in order to save the reserves and increase the productivity of cereals,
all the stakeholders and donor agencies decided to induce changes in
agricultural technology and practices.
GREEN REVOLUTION’S CONTRIBUTION TO INDIA’S AGRICULTURAL GROWTH
The introduction of the Green Revolution in India tremendously increased
wheat production and changed India’s status from a food deficient country to
one of the leading agricultural nations. Though the revolution succeeded in
transforming our agricultural sector, it also had its drawbacks.
| Benefits | Drawbacks |
| • Increased productivity: Food grains saw an exponential rise after the green revolution. It resulted in a grain output of 131 million tonnes in the year 1978-79 . • The biggest rise was seen in Wheat, whose production increased by more than three times between 1967-68 and 2003-04. | • Impact on environment:. • The repetitive cropping pattern and increased crop intensity reduced the soil fertility leading to desertification. • An exponential rise in the tubewells reduced the water table. • Increased use of fertilisers, pesticides, and herbicides has caused the soil to become more toxic, causing acidification. |
| • Food security: The Green revolution made our country self sufficient in food grains and provided food security. | • Health problems: The overuse of chemical fertilisers, pesticides and herbicides resulted in an increased incidence of illnesses such as cancer, renal failure, stillbirths, and congenital disabilities. |
| • Financial stability: The green revolution enabled farmers to switch from subsistence to commercial farming thus providing them better sources of income and stability. | • Subsidy: Subsidy as a concept emerged during the Green Revolution and it is currently hurting the government’s finances. |
| • Reduced imports: With the increase in availability of food grains, India became self-sufficient and had sufficient stock in the central pool. | • Unequal income: Due to the Green Revolution’s emphasis on inputs, only wealthy farmers who could afford those inputs were able to become wealthy at the expense of small and marginal farmers, which widened the income gap between them. |
| • Employment: Due to multiple cropping and increased yield, there was an increased demand for labour force in the agricultural sector. | • Change in consumption pattern: It led to an increase in the consumption of wheat and rice. As a result, consumption of coarse cereals such as jowar, bajra, millet etc decreased. |
| • Boost to industries: Since agricultural products are often used as raw materials in various industries, the growth of the agricultural sector provided a boost to the industrial sector. • There was also increased demand for agricultural equipment such as tractors, thrasher and other inputs like chemical fertilisers, pesticides, weedicides etc. | • Benefit to limited areas: The revolution mostly focused on increasing the production of wheat and rice. • As a result, only those areas growing wheat and rice such as Punjab and Hayana benefited the most. The entire Eastern region of West Bengal, Orissa, Assam, etc was completely unaffected. • The high yield crops require more water and fertilisers as compared to the normal varieties of crops. This constrained it to resource rich states and arid states could not benefit. |
| • Dispersal of Rice and Wheat cultivation to non-traditional areas: Green Revolution spread the Rice cultivation to the semiarid areas of Punjab, Haryana and Western Uttar Pradesh, and the wheat cultivation to the areas of Eastern Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan and some parts of Maharashtra, Gujarat and West Bengal. | • No focus on non-food crops: The main crops during the revolution were Wheat, Rice, Jowar, Bajra and Maize. Non food grains were excluded from the ambit of this revolution. • As a result, India now needs to import pulses and oil seeds. |
CONCLUSION
According to the World Population Prospects (WPP), India will have the largest
population in the world by 2023. Therefore, India now requires a second green
revolution in which it can rectify the mistakes of the past revolution and focus
on other aspects such as the environment, poor farmers, non food crops etc
and help improve agriculture’s resilience to climate change and environmental
sustainability.
