Agro Climatic Regional Planning in India: Role of Agro Industries and Infrastructure

This paper is designed to (i) comment on the work on agro-climatic regional planning done so far; (ii) discuss the role of agro processing industries in agroclimatic regional planning exercise underway; (iii) comment on the data collected on infrastructure activities; and (iv) comment on the data base required for modelling and optimization of activities in each zone, keeping the above mentioned scenario in mind. While the initial attempt by the planning commission to introduce agroclimatic regional planning is pioneering in nature, it is a t best only indicative and is amenable to arrive at some general strategic guidelines. In the subsequent phases, an effort should be made to delineate more homogenous producing regions and consuming centres. In addition, the effort should now be to move from descriptive to modelling and quantitative analysis by the collection and compilation of the type of data and crop and livestock activities for each region and its sub zones. Similarly the available information on agro industries need to be segregated at the regional and sub zonal level so that this forms the base for generation of alternatives for future growth of opportunities (within the framework indicated in Section II of this paper) with the additional raw material projected to be available for processing due to appropriate policies for adjustment of production in the light of each regions comparative advantage. In this context, association of a technology development institution like the Central Food Technology Research Institutes would be extremely helpful in generating alternatives.