INDIA AGRICULTURAL DYNAMICS - WEAK-LINK IN DEVELOPMENT

There has been a growing concern on the performance of agricultural se ctor in recent years, The regional balance in growth has also been a m atter of interest both in policies and academic discussions, The centr al budget speeches in recent years have noted the need to accelerate a gricultural growth as it has been slower growth than the growth of the other sectors. The declining real public investment in agriculture ha s also been cited with concern given the implication of such trends to agricultural growth, It is useful to examine the longer-term trends i n agricultural growth to place in perspective the more recent trends. This paper is an attempt to assess the trends in agricultural output b oth at the national level and the state level. The study shows that th ere are strong cyclical patterns in the growth trends and there is evi dence of convergence of the growth rates at the state level in the sho rter intervals of time. But in the longer term, the state level growth rates converge to different levels. Thus, the concerns regarding slow er rate of growth at the overall level and the divergent growth patter n of the states are well founded. Unless there are policies which stre ngthen the investment climate in agriculture, by operating on both the supply and demand factors, the slower growth at the national level an d the consequent state level imbalances would continue.