Land Use, Farming Systems and Cropping Seasons in India

1. Land-use accounting: reporting area and the nine categories

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• Reporting area is the area for which land revenue departments keep land-use records. The nine categories add up to it. It changes with revenue estimates. The geographical area, measured by the Survey of India, stays fixed.
• Records cover only about 93% of India's 3.28 million sq km. Most north-eastern states except Assam do not report fully, and areas occupied by Pakistan and China are unsurveyed (Class 10, Resources and Development). Reporting area is about 30.8 crore ha, against a geographical area of about 32.87 crore ha (verify current).
• The nine land-use categories (Class 12, Land Resources and Agriculture):

#	Category	Key point
i	Area classified as forest	Land the government has marked out for forest. It can rise with no real rise in tree cover. Actual cover is measured by FSI.
ii	Barren and wasteland	Barren hills, deserts and ravines. Cannot be farmed with available technology.
iii	Land put to non-agricultural uses	Settlements, roads, canals, industry and shops
iv	Permanent pastures and grazing land	Mostly owned by the panchayat or government. The panchayat part is a common property resource.
v	Misc. tree crops and groves	Mostly private orchards. Not counted in net sown area.
vi	Culturable wasteland	Left uncultivated for more than 5 years. Can be reclaimed.
vii	Current fallow	Left uncultivated for 1 agricultural year or less, so the soil can recover fertility naturally
viii	Fallow other than current fallow	Left uncultivated for more than 1 year but less than 5 years
ix	Net sown area	The physical area sown and harvested, counted once however many crops it carries

• Class 10 groups these into five heads: forests, land not available for cultivation, other uncultivated land, fallow lands and net sown area. Trap: "marginal land" is NOT a category.
• Spatial pattern: net sown area is over 80% of total area in Punjab and Haryana. It is under 10% in Arunachal Pradesh, Mizoram, Manipur and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands. Forest area is still below the 33% goal of the forest policy (1952; kept in the National Forest Policy 1988).

2. Land-use change and the commons

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• Why land use changes: land is fixed, but the economy changes in three ways (Class 12).
• Size: population, income and technology grow, so marginal land comes into use.
• Composition: industry and services grow faster than farming, so land moves to non-farm uses. This is sharpest around cities.

• Farm pressure persists: the share of people who depend on farming falls more slowly than farming's share of GDP, and more people must be fed.

• Land-use changes in India, 1950-51 to 2019-20 (shares of reporting area, Fig. 3.1):

• Five rose: forests (more land marked out, not more trees), non-agricultural uses (the highest rate of increase), permanent pastures, current fallow (goes up and down with rainfall) and net sown area (a recent rise from reclaiming culturable wasteland, after a slow fall).

• Four fell: barren land, culturable wasteland, tree crops and groves, and other fallows.

• Know the difference between actual increase (later value minus earlier value) and rate of increase (that difference ÷ base-year value × 100).

• New demands on land: urban sprawl onto farmland, solar parks and highways.
• Common property resources (CPRs): owned by the state and meant for the community. Every member has the right to use them, with duties attached, but nobody owns them. Examples are community forests, pastures, village ponds and public spaces. They give fodder, fuel, fruits, nuts, fibre and medicinal plants, and matter most to landless people, marginal farmers and women.
• N.S. Jodha's studies (1980s) recorded CPRs shrinking through privatisation and encroachment. The Forest Rights Act 2006 recognises community forest resource rights.

3. Agricultural land use: cultivable land, gross cropped area and cropping intensity

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• Why land matters more to farming:
• Farming is purely land-based, so lack of land goes with rural poverty.
• Land quality directly sets yields.

• Owning land brings status and serves as security for loans and hard times.

• Total cultivable land = net sown area + all fallows + culturable wasteland. It fell from 59.5% to 57.7% of reporting area (1950-51 to 2019-20; Table 3.1).

• Within total cultivable land, net sown area rose from 70.0% to 79.0%. Culturable wasteland fell from 13.4% to 6.8%, and other fallow from 10.2% to 6.4%. So there is little room left to expand farming.
• The answer is land-saving technologies of two kinds: those that raise the yield per hectare, and those that raise total output per hectare per year by using the land more intensively. The second kind also creates more farm jobs.
• Gross cropped area (GCA): total area sown in a year, counting a field once for each crop grown on it.
• Cropping intensity = GCA ÷ NSA × 100. A high value suits land-scarce, labour-rich India: it uses land fully and cuts rural unemployment. All-India it is about 150-155%, with Punjab near 190% (verify current).
• Multiple cropping: raising two or more crops from one field in a year, one after another or together. It spreads risk, ensures at least one harvest and gives periodic harvests (Class 7, The Story of Indian Farming). Related practices:
• Intercropping: crops grown together in rows.
• Mixed cropping: crops grown together on the same field.
• Crop rotation: different crops in different seasons, so the soil does not lose particular nutrients.

• Relay cropping: the next crop is sown before the current one is harvested.

• Cost: in irrigated areas, multiple cropping has cut fallow periods and pushed out legumes (Section 12).

4. The physical frame: agro-climatic zones, agro-ecological regions and the monsoon

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• Agriculture and allied activities (crops, livestock, beekeeping, fisheries, silk, fibre) give a little over 18% of GDP and employ about 46% of workers (2022-23). Women are over 75% of rural farm workers (Class 7, 2025; verify current).
• Class 7 lists seven climate types: alpine, temperate, subtropical, arid, tropical wet, semi-arid and tropical.
• Agro-climatic zones of India: the Planning Commission set up 15 regions in 1988-89, based on terrain, soils, climate and water, to balance development across regions. The 15 are:
• Western Himalayan; Eastern Himalayan
• Lower Gangetic Plains; Middle Gangetic Plains; Upper Gangetic Plains; Trans-Gangetic Plains
• Eastern Plateau and Hills; Central Plateau and Hills; Western Plateau and Hills; Southern Plateau and Hills
• East Coast Plains and Hills; West Coast Plains and Ghats; Gujarat Plains and Hills

• Western Dry Region; Islands

• Agro-ecological regions: ICAR's NBSS&LUP divides India into 20 regions and 60 sub-regions. They are based on terrain, soils, bioclimate and length of growing period (the number of days with enough moisture for crops). The National Agricultural Research Project uses 127 smaller zones within states.

• Monsoon and farming:
• The south-west monsoon (June-September) drives kharif crops in the north and centre.
• The north-east monsoon (October-December) brings rain to the east and south. Coastal Tamil Nadu and Kerala get both monsoons.

• The south can grow a crop between the two monsoons. The north relies on groundwater, canals, ponds and soil moisture. Tamil Nadu, West Bengal and Andhra Pradesh grow rice all year.

• The Arthashastra's "good rainy season": one-third of the rain at the start and end of the season, two-thirds in the middle, matching the crop cycle.

5. Cropping seasons: kharif, rabi and zaid

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Season	Timing	North	South
Kharif	June-September; sown with monsoon onset, harvested September-October	Rice, cotton, bajra, maize, jowar, tur (plus moong, urad, jute, soybean, groundnut)	Rice, maize, ragi, jowar, groundnut
Rabi	Oct-Nov to Mar-Apr (Class 10: sown Oct-Dec, harvested Apr-Jun)	Wheat, barley, peas, gram, rapeseed and mustard	Rice, maize, ragi, groundnut, jowar
Zaid	April-June, after the rabi harvest, mostly on irrigated land	Watermelon, muskmelon, cucumber, vegetables, fodder	Rice, vegetables, fodder

• Kharif rice belts: Assam, West Bengal, coastal Odisha, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, the Konkan coast, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. Irrigated Punjab and Haryana now grow it too. Assam, West Bengal and Odisha grow three paddy crops a year: aus, aman and boro.
• Rabi success depends on: winter rain from western disturbances (Class 10 calls them western temperate cyclones), and Green Revolution irrigation in Punjab, Haryana, western Uttar Pradesh and parts of Rajasthan.
• Sugarcane takes almost a year to grow.
• The three distinct seasons exist only in the north and interior. In the south, warmth lets tropical crops grow all year if there is soil moisture, so the same crop can be grown three times.
• The words kharif, rabi and zaid are Arabic and have been used since Mughal times. The older names were kedara (wet crops), haimana (winter crops) and graishmika (summer crops).
• Risks: kharif needs a timely monsoon, and too much rain destroys crops.

6. Irrigated and rainfed farming: protective, productive, dryland and wetland

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• By main source of moisture, farming is irrigated or rainfed (barani) (Class 12).
• Irrigated farming: crops get water from canals, wells, tubewells or tanks. By purpose it is of two kinds:
• Protective irrigation adds to rainfall to save crops from water shortage. It spreads limited water over the widest area. Examples: Stage I of the Indira Gandhi Canal, and PMKSY's "Har Khet Ko Pani".

• Productive irrigation gives enough water through the season for high yields. It uses more water per hectare (e.g. Green Revolution Punjab).

• Rainfed farming depends on rain alone. It is split by how much soil moisture there is:

• Dryland farming: areas with under 75 cm of annual rain. Grows hardy, drought-resistant ragi, bajra, moong, gram and guar (fodder). Uses soil-moisture conservation and rainwater harvesting. Trap: sugarcane is NOT a dryland crop.

• Wetland farming: rain in the rainy season is more than crops need. Grows water-hungry rice, jute and sugarcane, plus freshwater fish farming. Faces flood and soil-erosion risks.

• Rainfed land is about half of net sown area and grows most of India's pulses, millets, oilseeds and cotton. The National Rainfed Area Authority (2006) and watershed programmes target it (verify current).

• Irrigation heritage (Class 7): traditional water structures include kul, kund, ahar, pokhar, khadin, arakere, kolam, surangam, tadagam and eri. Examples:
• Phad: community canals that divert river water, Maharashtra.
• Bamboo drip irrigation: north-east India.
• Kallanai (Grand Anicut): built by Karikala on the Kaveri about 1,800 years ago.

• Munsar lake: Viramgam, Gujarat, 11th century.

• Modern drip and sprinkler systems save water as groundwater falls. Irrigation coverage (NCERT: about 33% of cultivated area; now net irrigated area is over half of net sown area — verify current).

7. Types of farming: primitive subsistence, intensive subsistence, commercial and plantation

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• Primitive subsistence farming: small patches, simple tools (hoe, dao, digging sticks) and family or community labour. It depends on the monsoon and natural soil fertility. Yields are low because no fertilisers or modern inputs are used.
• Shifting cultivation ("slash and burn"), in steps:
• Clear and burn a forest patch.
• Crop it until the soil loses fertility.

• Move to a fresh patch and leave the old one for nature to restore.

• Class 10's Rinjha caselet (near Diphu, Assam) shows bamboo canals carrying spring water to such fields.

• Regional names of shifting cultivation in India:

Name	Area
Jhumming	North-east (Assam, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland)
Pamlou	Manipur
Dipa	Bastar (Chhattisgarh), Andaman and Nicobar Islands
Bewar / Dahiya	Madhya Pradesh
Podu / Penda	Andhra Pradesh
Pama Dabi / Koman / Bringa	Odisha
Kumari	Western Ghats
Valre / Waltre	South-eastern Rajasthan
Khil	Himalayan belt
Kuruwa	Jharkhand

• Names abroad: Milpa (Mexico and Central America), Conuco (Venezuela), Roca (Brazil), Masole (Central Africa), Ladang (Indonesia), Ray (Vietnam).
• Jhum cycles have shortened from 15-20 years to 3-5 years. This causes erosion, landslides and forest loss. Responses include terracing, agroforestry and Nagaland's NEPED project.
• Intensive subsistence farming: found where population pressure is high (Ganga plain, deltas, Kerala). It is labour-heavy, with high inputs and irrigation. Inheritance splits holdings into uneconomic sizes, but farmers have no other livelihood.
• Commercial farming: heavy use of HYV seeds, chemical fertilisers and pesticides to grow for the market. The degree varies: rice is commercial in Punjab and Haryana but subsistence in Odisha.
• Plantation farming: a type of commercial farming where a single crop is grown over a large area, linking farming and industry. It needs a lot of capital and migrant labour, and good transport is vital. Examples: tea (Assam, North Bengal), coffee (Karnataka), rubber, sugarcane and banana.

8. The story of Indian farming: ancient knowledge and traditional systems

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• Early farming (Class 7):
• Rice grains in the Ganga plain from the 7th-8th millennium BCE, though systematic cultivation may have come later.
• Barley and millets at Mehrgarh (Baluchistan), 7th millennium BCE.
• Barley and wheat were Harappan staples, with rice at some sites by the 3rd millennium BCE.

• Animals were domesticated from about 3500 BCE.

• Kalibangan (Rajasthan, about 2800 BCE): criss-cross (perpendicular) furrows show intercropping, still seen in the 1960s. The Vedas name yava (barley), godhuma (wheat) and vrihi (rice).

• Texts:
• Arthashastra: seed preparation.
• Sangam literature.
• Amarakosha: twelve kinds of farmland.
• Krishi-Parashara.
• Varahamihira's Brihatsamhita: grafting (joining two plants so they grow as one).
• Surapala's Vrikshayurveda: seed treatment and watering.

• The ancient seed drill prepared the soil, planted the seed and closed the furrow in one operation.

• Traditional systems: terrace farming (Uttarakhand), kulagar (Konkani homestead gardens, Goa), gokrishi (cow manure and bullock ploughing). Bio-inputs include panchagavya and beejamrit.

• Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR): founded in 1929 and works under DARE. It has documented about 5,000 traditional practices and tested over a hundred; over 85% were found scientifically valid.
• Zabo system (Chakhesang Nagas, Kikruma, Phek district, Nagaland), from top to bottom:
• Protected forest on the hilltop.
• Ponds to harvest water.
• Cattle yards on the slopes.
• Rice-and-fish paddies below.

• Earthen bunds save soil and water.

• Globally Important Agricultural Heritage Systems (GIAHS), FAO's list of traditional farming systems. India has three:

• Pampore saffron, Kashmir (2011).
• Koraput traditional agriculture, Odisha (2012).

• Kuttanad, Kerala (2013).

• Kuttanad below-sea-level farming: near Vembanad lake, paddy is grown about 1-3 m below sea level behind dykes. The Thanneermukkom barrier keeps out salt water. It combines rice with fishing and duck rearing and is called Kerala's "rice bowl".

9. Agricultural development since 1947 and the Green Revolution

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• Before 1947: mostly subsistence farming, with droughts and famines (Bengal 1943). Partition gave about one-third of irrigated land to Pakistan, and much jute and cotton land too.
• First strategy after 1947:
• Switch from cash crops to food crops.
• Grow more crops on land already farmed.

• Bring cultivable and fallow land under the plough.

• Output rose at first, then stagnated in the late 1950s.

• Intensive Agricultural District Programme (IADP, 1960-61): gave selected districts a package of credit, seeds, fertiliser and extension advice. The Intensive Agricultural Area Programme (IAAP) followed in 1964-65. The droughts of 1965 and 1966 forced food imports (PL-480).
• High-yielding varieties (HYVs): dwarf wheat from Mexico (Borlaug, CIMMYT) and rice from the Philippines (IRRI, IR-8), available by the mid-1960s. They need assured irrigation and heavy fertiliser, and pests attack them easily, so pesticide use rose.
• Green Revolution: HYVs + fertiliser + irrigation (later machinery) in irrigated Punjab, Haryana, western Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh and Gujarat. Gains:
• India became self-reliant in food.

• Agro-input and agro-processing industries grew.

• Its limit: at first it reached only irrigated areas and wheat, so regional gaps widened until it spread east and to central India after the 1970s. M.S. Swaminathan (Bharat Ratna 2024) was its architect. Fertiliser use has risen 15 times since the mid-1960s.

• Later phases:
• 1980s: focus on rainfed areas.
• 1988: agro-climatic planning.
• Diversification into dairy, poultry, horticulture, livestock and fish farming.

• 1990s: liberalisation.

• Costs: poorer soils, falling groundwater, chemicals in soil and water, cancer clusters (Punjab's Malwa "cancer train") and harm to bees. The economics are covered in the economy subject.

10. Agrarian structure: revenue systems, land reforms and shrinking holdings

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• Land revenue systems under British rule:

System	Area	Who paid revenue
Zamindari (Permanent Settlement 1793)	Bengal, Bihar	Intermediary landlords; the most exploitative
Ryotwari (Munro, Reade)	Madras, Bombay	Cultivators directly
Mahalwari (1820s-30s)	North-Western Provinces, Punjab	Village communities

• Land reforms were the main focus of the First Five Year Plan. They included abolishing intermediaries, tenancy reform, ceilings on holdings, consolidation, and cooperation or collectivisation. Weak political will against landlord lobbies made implementation "lukewarm". Successes: Operation Barga (West Bengal, 1978) and Kerala.
• Fragmentation of landholdings: population pressure and inheritance split farms into small, scattered plots. These are uneconomic and hard to mechanise.
• Consolidation of landholdings: regrouping scattered plots into compact blocks. It was done well in Punjab, Haryana and western Uttar Pradesh. Some states never did it, and others need a second round.
• Average size of operational holding: 1.08 ha (Agriculture Census 2015-16), with about 86% of holdings small or marginal (below 2 ha). Class 7 gives about three-fourths of a hectare (Agriculture Census 2021-22 — verify current).
• Ways to pool small farms: NITI Aayog's Model Land Leasing Act (2016) and the 10,000 FPO (farmer producer organisation) scheme (2020).
• Digital land records:
• DILRMP (started as NLRMP in 2008, revamped in 2016) digitises land records and maps.
• Unique Land Parcel Identification Number (ULPIN, "Bhu-Aadhaar") is a 14-digit alphanumeric ID for each land parcel, based on its geo-coordinates, rolled out from 2021.
• SVAMITVA (2020) maps rural homes by drone.

11. Problems of Indian agriculture and the support system

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• Problems of Indian agriculture vary by region, but these are common (Class 12):
• Erratic monsoon: drought and flood are the "twin menace". Drylands of Maharashtra, Gujarat and Rajasthan had flash floods in 2006 and 2017.
• Low productivity: yields and labour output are below those of the USA, Russia and Japan, and lowest in drylands.
• Agricultural indebtedness: costly inputs push small farmers to banks and moneylenders. Crop failures trap them in debt, linked to farmer suicides (NCRB ADSI — verify current).
• Weak land reforms and small, fragmented holdings (Section 10).
• Lack of commercialisation: small farmers grow food grains mainly for their own families.
• Agricultural underemployment: 4-8 months of seasonal unemployment in unirrigated tracts.

• Degradation of farmland (Section 12).

• Class 7 adds: costly machines, too little side income, climate change, and some estimates of about 2,300 farmers quitting farming each day. The Ganga basin, which feeds over 500 million people, is under stress from glacier melt, water diverted to irrigation, groundwater pumping and dams.

• Government support: subsidised inputs, weather information, research and training, cheap power, procurement at fair prices, cold storage and e-NAM. Earlier tools include the Farmers' Portal, Kisan Call Centres, KCC and the Soil Health Card (2015).
• Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY, 2016): crop insurance against natural calamities, pests and diseases. Farmers pay premiums of 2% (kharif), 1.5% (rabi) and 5% (commercial and horticultural crops). Joining became voluntary in 2020.
• Digital Agriculture Mission (approved 2 September 2024): builds AgriStack, which has three parts:
• A farmer ID registry.
• Geo-referenced village maps.
• A Digital Crop Survey recording the crop sown on each plot every season.
• It also adds the Krishi Decision Support System.

12. Sustainable pathways: fixing the rice-wheat system, organic and natural farming

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• How farmland degrades:
• Irrigated areas: waterlogging, salinisation (the main form) and alkalisation, plus pesticide build-up. Legumes have been pushed out and fallows shortened, so natural nitrogen fixation is lost.

• Rainfed areas: water and wind erosion.

• Rice-wheat cropping system: paddy in kharif followed by wheat in rabi, on about 10 million ha of the Indo-Gangetic plains. In Punjab and Haryana it has drained groundwater (about 80% of Punjab's area is overexploited) and harmed soils. It also drives stubble burning.

• NPK ratio imbalance: the ideal ratio of nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium is taken as about 4:2:1. Cheap urea skews use towards nitrogen, worst in Punjab and Haryana. Responses: neem-coated urea (2015), Soil Health Cards (2015) and nutrient-based subsidy reform.
• Punjab Preservation of Subsoil Water Act 2009 (and a similar Haryana Act): bans paddy transplanting before a notified mid-June date, so paddy uses monsoon rain.
• Side effect: the later harvest leaves less time before wheat sowing.

• Result: more stubble burning.

• Water-saving and residue fixes:

• Direct-seeded rice: seed is sown straight into the field instead of transplanting seedlings into flooded fields. Saves water and labour and cuts methane. Punjab pays an incentive (verify current).
• Zero tillage: wheat is sown into unploughed soil with crop residue left on it (Happy Seeder). Saves water, fuel and time and avoids burning.
• System of Rice Intensification (SRI): developed in Madagascar in the 1980s. Uses young single seedlings, wide spacing, intermittent watering and organic manure. Adopted in Tamil Nadu, Tripura and Bihar.

• Crop diversification: moving out of paddy into pulses, maize, oilseeds, millets and horticulture, helped by incentives such as Haryana's Mera Pani Meri Virasat (verify current).

• Organic farming: no synthetic fertilisers or pesticides. Uses compost, seed cake, manure, crop rotation and neem. Promoted by the Paramparagat Krishi Vikas Yojana (PKVY, 2015) through farmer clusters, PGS-India certification and marketing.

• Sikkim organic state: banned chemical fertilisers and pesticides in phases (Class 7: 2014). It became the world's first fully organic state in 2016 and won FAO's Future Policy Gold Award in 2018.
• Natural farming: uses on-farm inputs (jeevamrit, beejamrit), mulching and mixed crops. The National Mission on Natural Farming (November 2024) targets 7.5 lakh ha.
• National Mission for Sustainable Agriculture (NMSA): one of eight missions under NAPCC (2008). It promotes location-specific integrated farming and soil and moisture conservation. Class 12's "Rashtriya Vikas Yojana" should read Rashtriya Krishi Vikas Yojana (RKVY, 2007).

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Exam angles

Prelims — high-yield facts and traps

• Fallow thresholds: current fallow is 1 year or less; other fallow is 1-5 years; culturable wasteland is more than 5 years.
• "Marginal land" is a land-use category: FALSE.
• Forest share rose because of afforestation: FALSE. It rose because more land was notified as forest.
• Reporting area is fixed by the Survey of India: FALSE. The Survey of India fixes the geographical area.
• Total cultivable land = NSA + all fallows + culturable wasteland. It fell from 59.5% to 57.7% (1950-51 to 2019-20).
• Cropping intensity = GCA ÷ NSA × 100.
• Fastest rate of increase: land under non-agricultural uses. Categories that declined: barren land, culturable wasteland, tree crops and groves, other fallows.
• Shifting cultivation names: Podu (Andhra Pradesh), Bewar (Madhya Pradesh), Kuruwa (Jharkhand), Valre (south-eastern Rajasthan), Kumari (Western Ghats), Pamlou (Manipur), Dipa (Bastar), Khil (Himalayas).
• Shifting cultivation abroad: Milpa (Mexico), Ladang (Indonesia), Roca (Brazil), Masole (Central Africa), Conuco (Venezuela), Ray (Vietnam).
• Seasons: gram and mustard are rabi; bajra, tur and cotton are kharif; watermelon and fodder are zaid. Older names: kedara, haimana, graishmika.
• Dryland farming is below 75 cm of rain. Sugarcane is a dryland crop: FALSE. Main degradation in irrigated areas: salinisation.
• HYVs came from Mexico (wheat) and the Philippines (rice). IADP: 1960-61; IAAP: 1964-65; agro-climatic planning: 1988.
• 15 agro-climatic regions (Planning Commission). 20 agro-ecological regions and 60 sub-regions (NBSS&LUP).
• GIAHS: Pampore (2011), Koraput (2012), Kuttanad (2013). Zabo: Nagaland. Sikkim fully organic: 2016.
• Schemes: PMFBY premiums 2 / 1.5 / 5%; PKVY 2015; NMSA under NAPCC 2008; ULPIN has 14 digits; Digital Agriculture Mission 2024; NMNF 2024.

Mains — GS-I and GS-III themes

1. Explain land-use change in India through the changing size and make-up of the economy. Why does pressure on farmland persist?
2. Why is high cropping intensity good for India? What are its ecological costs (groundwater, soil, loss of legumes)?
3. Discuss the regional and environmental effects of the Green Revolution, and the case for a second, regionally balanced one.
4. Small and fragmented holdings are the root of many farm problems. Examine this, with remedies: consolidation, leasing, FPOs and digital land records (ULPIN).
5. Can traditional knowledge (Zabo, Kuttanad, organic and natural farming) make farming sustainable without hurting food security?
6. The rice-wheat system in Punjab and Haryana: the subsoil water Acts, stubble burning, DSR, zero tillage and crop diversification.
7. Rainfed and dryland farming: why yields are low, and the role of watershed development and protective irrigation.

Current-affairs hooks

• Monsoon performance and kharif sowing reports; heatwaves and wheat yields.
• Stubble-burning data; paddy-transplanting date notifications in Punjab and Haryana.
• Releases of Agriculture Census 2021-22 and Land Use Statistics (verify current).
• Rollout of AgriStack and the Digital Crop Survey; ULPIN coverage.
• The National Mission on Natural Farming; organic missions in Sikkim and the north-east.
• New FAO GIAHS designations; NCRB data on farmer distress; PMFBY claims disputes.