Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
TABLE 3.1 Indicators of Indian infrastructure
Paved road
(thousand
Ground line
Cellular
Period
kilometers)
telephones
phones
Televisions
Radios
(per 1,000 people)
1960s
1.450
1970s
334 a
2.700
0.05 a
31.05 a
1980s
4.370
7.32
61.52
1990s
16.124
1.332
57.25
103.96
2000
1,363
37.523 b
6.262 b
78.03
120.53
(per household) c
1960s
0.007
1970s
0.014
0.000
0.155
1980s
0.022
0.037
0.308
1990s
0.081
0.007
0.286
0.520
2000
0.188
0.031
0.390
0.603
SOURCE : Authors' calculations based on data from World Bank (2003).
NOTE : — indicates not available.
a For 1970 only.
b For 2001 only.
c Assuming five people per household.
technology and their land-allocation decisions to various crops are no longer
dictated by technology-related risks.
Thinness and Volatility of Global Food Markets
Forty years ago, one of the central drivers of food and agricultural policies in
India was attaining self-sufficiency and reducing reliance on international mar-
kets. There were two arguments for this policy standing: (1) India could not risk
its national food security on a highly volatile and a too-thin world market and
(2) as a large country, India could destabilize the world market by becoming an
active buyer. However, during the past two decades the reality has changed on
both counts.
The production trends and projections suggest that the first argument is no
longer persuasive. Total cereal production has more than quadrupled since In-
dia's independence, from about 50 million tons in 1950/51 to about 210 million
tons in 1999/2000, rendering the country a net exporter of grain (Dev 2003).
Several studies have attempted to project future demand and supply of food-
grains in India. However, the predictions ranged from India being a net exporter
of about 8 million tons of rice and wheat (Gulati and Kelly 1999) to being a ma-
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