Rice

Detail

What rice is and why it matters

• Rice is a kharif crop. Kharif means a crop sown when the south-west monsoon begins (about June–July) and harvested in September–October.
• Rice is the staple food (the main daily food) of most Indians.
• It covers about a quarter of India's cropped area.
• Size of the harvest: India grew a record 1,501.84 lakh tonnes (about 150 million tonnes) of rice in 2024-25. This was 123.59 lakh tonnes more than 2023-24 (1,378.25 lakh tonnes) [2].
• Share in foodgrains: India's total foodgrain output in 2024-25 was 3,577.32 lakh tonnes. Rice made up about 42% of it, more than any other grain (wheat was 1,179.45 lakh tonnes) [2].
• Ten-year growth: rice output went up from 1,044.08 lakh tonnes (2015-16) to 1,501.84 lakh tonnes (2024-25), a rise of about 44% [2].

Conditions of growth

Factor	What rice needs	Why it matters
Temperature	Above 25°C	Rice is a crop of the humid tropics (hot, wet lands near the equator)
Humidity	High	Moist air keeps the plant from drying out
Rainfall	More than 100 cm a year	The paddy field must stay flooded while the plant grows
Irrigation	Needed where rain is under 100 cm	Canals and tubewells make up for low rain
Altitude	Sea level up to about 2,000 m	So it grows from coastal deltas to Himalayan valleys

• Irrigation means giving water to crops from canals, wells or tanks instead of waiting for rain.
• A tubewell is a deep, narrow well bored into the ground. A pump lifts groundwater (water stored in rocks and soil under the ground) through it.
• Rice has many varieties. This is why one crop can grow in very different places, from humid eastern India to dry, irrigated Punjab.
• In the Himalayas and north-west India, rice is grown only as a kharif monsoon crop, because winters there are too cold.

Where it grows: the natural belt

• Northern and north-eastern plains: the Ganga plain (Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal) and the Brahmaputra valley (Assam). Here the soil is rich alluvium (fine soil laid down by rivers), rain is heavy and there is plenty of water.
• Coastal areas: the Malabar coast (Kerala, Karnataka) and the Coromandel and Odisha coasts.
• Deltas: the Ganga-Brahmaputra delta (West Bengal) and the east-coast deltas of the Mahanadi (Odisha), Godavari and Krishna (Andhra Pradesh) and Kaveri (Tamil Nadu). A delta is the flat, fan-shaped land a river builds at its mouth. It is low, flat, wet and fertile, so it suits flooded paddy fields.

Where it grows: the irrigated belt (since the 1970s)

Rice spread into dry north-west India in the 1970s

• Punjab, Haryana, western Uttar Pradesh and parts of Rajasthan get much less than 100 cm of rain.
• Canals and tubewells were built and supplied water during the Green Revolution.
• Result: these dry states became major rice growers, although rice is not their natural crop.

Three rice crops a year: aus, aman and boro

• In West Bengal (Class 10 adds Assam and Odisha), farmers can grow three rice crops in one year.

Crop	Season	How it is grown
Aus	Autumn crop	Sown before or with the early monsoon showers; harvested in autumn
Aman	Main winter crop	Grown during the monsoon and harvested in early winter; the largest of the three
Boro	Spring-summer crop	Grown in the dry season with irrigation only

• South India also grows two or three rice crops a year, because it stays warm all year.
• The data shows this too: of the 2024-25 harvest, 1,227.72 lakh tonnes (about 82%) was kharif rice. Rabi (winter-sown) rice was 161.29 lakh tonnes and summer rice (which includes boro-type crops) was 112.84 lakh tonnes [2].

Leading states

• NCERT lists West Bengal, Uttar Pradesh and Punjab as the leading producers.
• Telangana has risen fast because its irrigation has grown, and it is now among the top states (verify the current ranking against DES state-wise estimates).

Yields: high and low

Yield means how much crop is harvested from one hectare of land.

Yield level	States	Main reason
High	Punjab, Tamil Nadu, Haryana, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, West Bengal, Kerala	Almost all rice is irrigated in the first four
Very low	Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Odisha	Rainfed farming: the crop gets only rainwater, so a poor monsoon means a poor harvest

Why Punjab's yield is high

• Farmers use better seeds (high-yielding varieties), fertilisers and pesticides.
• Assured canal and tubewell water means the crop does not depend on the monsoon.
• Punjab's dry climate means fewer pests and diseases than humid eastern India.

World position

• NCERT: India was the second-largest producer after China, with 22.07% of world output (2018).
• Now: India became the world's largest rice producer in 2024-25, ahead of China. It is also the largest exporter, with about 40% of world rice trade (verify current).
• Export curbs (2022-24): the government limited exports of non-basmati rice to keep prices low at home. The curbs were later relaxed.

Basmati rice

• Basmati is a long-grain, sweet-smelling (aromatic) rice. The grains get longer when cooked.
• GI (Geographical Indication): a legal tag that says a product comes from a certain region and gets its quality from that region. Only rice grown there can be sold under that name.
• Basmati got a GI in 2016 for parts of Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Delhi, western Uttar Pradesh and Jammu and Kashmir. These areas lie in the Indo-Gangetic plain and the Himalayan foothills.
• India supplies most of the world's basmati exports.
• Dispute: Pakistan contests India's application for a basmati GI in the European Union, because Pakistani Punjab also grows basmati (verify current).

Policy links

• Fortified rice in the PDS: fortified rice has added iron, folic acid and vitamin B12 to fight anaemia. The PDS (Public Distribution System) is the network of ration shops that sell cheap grain. See agri-marketing-msp-pds.
• Rice versus millets: in the International Year of Millets (2023), the government promoted Shree Anna (millets). Millets need much less water than rice. India produced 185.92 lakh tonnes of Shree Anna/nutri-cereals in 2024-25, compared with 1,501.84 lakh tonnes of rice [2].
• Sustainability: rice-wheat farming in Punjab-Haryana is lowering groundwater levels. DSR (Direct Seeded Rice: seeds sown straight into the field with no transplanting from a nursery) and SRI (System of Rice Intensification: fewer seedlings, wider spacing, fields kept moist rather than flooded) use less water. See land-use-farming-systems.

Prelims Hooks

• Rice needs a temperature above 25°C, high humidity and more than 100 cm of rain; below that, it needs irrigation.
• Altitude range of rice in India: sea level to about 2,000 m.
• Aus = autumn crop; aman = main winter (monsoon) crop; boro = irrigated spring-summer crop. Region: West Bengal, Assam and Odisha.
• Trap: Punjab and Haryana have high rice yields even though they get low rainfall, because almost all their rice is irrigated. Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Odisha (rainfed) have low yields.
• Rice spread into Punjab, Haryana, western UP and parts of Rajasthan in the 1970s, through canals and tubewells.
• Rice output in 2024-25: 1,501.84 lakh tonnes, a record and about 42% of all foodgrains [2].
• About 82% of rice in 2024-25 was the kharif crop [2].
• NCERT: India was 2nd after China (22.07%, 2018). Now: largest producer (2024-25) and largest exporter (about 40% of world trade).
• Basmati GI (2016) states: Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Delhi, western UP, J&K. Not included: Madhya Pradesh. Pakistan contests India's GI in the EU.

Mains Points

• Distribution pattern (GS-I): rice has two belts.
• The natural belt is the humid eastern plains, coasts and deltas, where there is heavy rain and alluvial soil.
• The irrigated belt is dry Punjab-Haryana, where canals and tubewells grow the crop.

• This shows that technology and irrigation can push a crop beyond its climatic limits.

• Regional yield gap (GS-III): irrigated Punjab, Haryana, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh have high yields. Rainfed Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Odisha have low yields.

• Policy responses: expand irrigation in eastern India, spread better seeds and promote drought-tolerant varieties.

• Sustainability (GS-III): growing a water-hungry crop in the dry north-west lowers groundwater, burns stubble (air pollution) and degrades soil.

• Policy responses: DSR and SRI, crop diversification, and promoting millets (International Year of Millets 2023).

• Food security and trade (GS-III): record output (1,501.84 lakh tonnes in 2024-25) and large stocks support the PDS and fortified rice [2].

• Export curbs (2022-24) showed that India's choices move world prices, because India holds about 40% of the world rice trade.
• The basmati GI dispute with Pakistan in the EU is a trade-policy issue.