Spatial economic analysis of agricultural land use changes: a case of peri-urban Bangalore, India

The present study analyses the drivers of agricultural land use in the peri-urban areas of Bangalore, India. The study uses a unique data set on land use, extracted from satellite images, for 1046 villages in the north-west transect of Bangalore City, covering the years 2001, 2005, 2011 and 2015. This dataset was combined with socio-economic variables compiled from various published sources. Linear fixed effects model and non-linear fractional probit model were estimated to analyse the factors influencing the agricultural land and fallow land use in the study area. Our analysis reveals a decline in the proportion of agricultural land and a rise in that of the fallow land. While the built up area has increased, area under water bodies that marked the city’s landscape has shrunken over time. Results of the econometric model show that an increase in population in suburban areas by 1% is associated with a decline in agricultural land by 0.028 ha. The effect of industrialisation on agricultural land diversion was estimated at 0.01 ha. Corollary to these findings, we find that a 1% rise in the level of suburbanisation leads to an increase in the size of fallow land by 0.025 ha and the effect of industrialisation is 0.011 ha. These results imply that there is a need for devising appropriate policy measures for conservation of agricultural land and water bodies and strengthen social safety nets for vulnerable people in the peri-urban areas.