Climate change and its impact on indian agriculture: a study of drought prone rayalaseema region

The paper focus India farmers’ income is raising at the rate of 1.5 percent and their expenditure is increasing at the rate of 4 percent. Nearly half of the Indian farmers are in debt trap. In the state of Andhra Pradesh 82 percent of farmers are under debt trap and a great number of suicide cases are coming from Andhra Pradesh. This is the fate of Indian agriculture in the globalization era. It is being argued that since India enjoy a comparative advantage in agricultural production; the liberal trade will benefit the Indian farmers by way of raising the output, employment and thereby gross national income. But Indian agriculture is now in a state of total neglect. Already liberalization process resulted in large scale rural unemployment, starvation deaths and suicidal deaths. Nearly 80 million hectares, out of the country's net sown area of around 143 million hectares, lack irrigation facilities and, hence, rely wholly on rain water for crop growth. Over 85 per cent of the pulses and coarse cereals, more than 75 per cent of the oilseeds and nearly 65 per cent of cotton are produced from such lands. The crop yields are quiet low. The paper emphasizes the climate change impacts on agriculture in general and Rayalaseema in particular.