In the present paper, Autoregressive Integrated Moving Average (ARIMA) models developed to forecast the prices of potato using time series data of eighteen years from 2002-2019. The best models selected by comparing Akaike Information Criteria (AIC), Bayesian Information Criteria (BIC), Mean Absolute Percent Error (MAPE), and Root Mean Square Error (RMSE). The study revealed that ARIMA (1,1,2), ARIMA (2,1,1)(0,0,2)[12], ARIMA (2,1,2), ARIMA (1,1,4)(0,0,1)[12], ARIMA (1,1,1)(0,1,2)[12], ARIMA (0,1,0)(0,1,1)[12], and ARIMA (3,1,3) were the best fitted models for forecasting of price of potato for the states of Utter Pradesh, West Bengal, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Punjab, Tripura and India respectively. The prices of potato in Utter Pradesh, West Bengal and India will be increasing with the first-quarter providing the highest price. The prices of potato in Madhya Pradesh and Tripura will be highest in the fourth quarter. In Punjab, the prices of potato will be increasing with the third-quarter. The forecast shows that market prices of potato in Utter Pradesh, West Bengal, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Punjab, Tripura, and overall India would be ruling in the highest value of .1208 `/qt, 1812 `/qt, 1345 `/qt, 1712 `/qt, 1354 `/qt, 2636 `/qt, and 1715 `/qt respectively for the year 2020.

The study attempts to examine the causal relation among export growth, inflation, foreign direct investment and real GDP growth rate for the period 1990-91 to 2018-19 using Vector Auto Regressive (VAR) model and Granger Causality test. Both the statistical techniques employed show similar results pertaining to the causal relationship among the variables selected for the study. The results show that FDI & Real GDP growth have positive effect on export growth and there is no evidence of inflation alone causing export growth, but inflation along with FDI and Real GDP cause the Export growth. There is also evidence that export growth, inflation, real GDP growth together cause FDI. The results also indicate that none of the aforementioned economic variables either individually or jointly cause real GDP growth. The authors opine that slow growth in exports had been compensated by domestic demand and services-led growth in the process of economic growth during the period of study. The study stressed the need for introducing structural reforms to enhance the competitiveness of Indian products in the international markets. The focus should be on designing a new strategy for technology-driven export-oriented sectors as the export stability is positively associated with economic growth.

The study was carried out in Barmer district of Rajasthan to analyze economics of Isabgol production and constraints faced by farmers. The primary data were collected from total sample of 80 farmer’s respondents. The study reveals that total cost of cultivation was higher ` 38407.69 per hectare on large farm, followed by ` 34132.15 on medium and ` 31281.96 on small farm and ` 34607.27 per hectare on overall farm. The cost of cultivation increases as farm size increase. It is observed from the result of F test p value is .001 which shows that there is statistically significant difference in cost of cultivation of Isabgol on different farm size category. The different cost on the basis of cost concept (Cost A1, A2, B1, B2, C1, C2 and C3) of Isabgol cultivation per hectare was calculated. The cost of production was found lower on large farm it was found to be ` 5053.64 per quintal followed by ` 5094.35 per quintal on medium farm, ` 5128.19 per quintal for small size farm which was found highest and ` 5092.06 per quintal for overall farm size. Farm business income, family labor income and farm investment income of Isabgol cultivation was found highest on large farm. The benefit cost ratio was found at 1.63 for overall farm size and was found to be 1.68 for large farm, 1.64 for medium farm and 1.63 for small farm. Crop damage by pest and diseases are the most important constraints faced by farmers in Isabgol production.

Area under production of vegetables is increasing over the years despite the gradual fall in total cultivable area in India. Nonetheless, growth in area is not same for all the vegetables. To the assess growth in area and address its disparity, the present study was carried out for the state of Karnataka for the period 1998-99 to 2017-18. About forty percent increase in area of vegetables has been observed over the period of two decades. Among the vegetables potato, and leafy vegetables recorded negative growth rate. Inequality between districts has also been observed for growth in area under vegetables. Markov chain analysis was employed to obtain transitional probability matrix of area under different vegetables. Projection for area of individual vegetable/vegetable groups for period of eight years has been made by simulating the transition probabilities. Tomato, gourds, cole crops and other vegetables group show positive trend of area over the study period. However, onion and leafy vegetables would have more or less constant area over the projected period. The unbalanced growth within the vegetable group could impact to the economy either by affecting dietary diversity or increasing import dependency for vegetables.

Area and production of Sorghum in Andhra Pradesh state increased by 6.8% and 9.7% but decreased by 12.1% and 9.8% in Telangana state, respectively since the last few years whereas the average yield was increased by 2.6% in both the states. The cost of production of sorghum was raised by 11-14% but the market price was increased by 7.5% only. Cost of production C2 was overlapped with the market price up to 2012-13 but later on, the market price was lower than C2 whereas the cost of production A2 overlapped with Minimum Support Price up to 2011-12 but MSP was quite higher after 2011-12. Operational costs ranged from 62-66% and fixed costs are 34-38% out of the total cost of cultivation of sorghum. The inverse relationship between yield and cost of production has proved in the log-linear regression model at 5% level of significance, due to low productivity of crop, still, there is need to develop High Yielding Varieties at State Agriculture Universities of both the states, modern technologies are to be adopted by the farmers to improve the productivity. In view of the importance of crops the government has to raise the remunerative market price and public awareness is to be created about the nutritional importance of crops so that the cropped area might be increased. Processing industries are to be encouraged on a large scale which generates employment for the rural youth; some more need-based processing technologies are to be developed at research institutes.

Investment is the expenditure incurred for real capital formation. A sample of 150 farmers was taken with 23 (15.3%), 28 (18.7%), 46 (30.7%), 43 (28.67%) and 10 (6.7%) farmers selected from marginal, small, semi-medium, medium and large farm size categories respectively in proportion to the share of respective category in total farmers in Punjab. Income, consumption, funds available post-consumption and investment level of the respondent farmers was worked out to find the factors that affect farm investment. Information related to education level, family type, cropping pattern and credit availability was also collected to see if they affect the level of investment. Income, consumption and funds available post-consumption were higher for larger farm households. The level of investment was higher on large farms but the investment per hectare was highest on marginal farms. The availability of credit was more on larger farms but per cent share of credit in investment decreased as the farm size increased as large farmers were using owned funds extensively. The regression analysis revealed that the size of the operational holdings, saving and the credit availability showed positive relation with the level of investment while the education level, family type and cropping intensity were non-significant.

This study comprise of minimizing farm risk through diversification in tomato based farming systems (TBFS). Primary data was collected from 3 taluks of Kolar District, Karnataka viz., Malur, Mulbagal and Srinivaspura representing cultivation of tomato hybrids, High yielding varieties (HYVs) and both, respectively. The total sample size was 150 tomato growers, 50 from each taluk. Tomato was grown as a major crop in all the 3 taluks. Farmers had diversified to different crops and farm enterprises along with tomato in order to reduce their income risk. Herfindahl diversification index and Crop diversification index was calculated. Based on which, farmers having high and medium degree of diversification faced lower income risk as compared to those farmers having lower degree of diversification. In all the three taluks, the inclusion of livestock as a component under any TBFS lowered the income risk faced by the farmers. The results of quantile regression analysis showed that, the variable CDI (Crop Diversification Index) was significant across all quantiles showing that as the degree of farm diversification increased, the variability in total annual income of the farmers decreased as risk was reduced when the income was diversified from different sources or enterprises.

Vegetable plays key role in providing nutrition to human body. Vegetables are major sources of vitamins, minerals, fiber, iron, calcium etc. Potato is the highest yielding vegetable in the world as well as in India. It is one of the significant vegetables of Indian consumer’s food basket. Despite of high production, due to seasonal production and perishable nature market arrival and price are highly volatile in nature. So, the present study was conducted with an intension to study the trend in arrival and price of potato in four major markets in India along with their Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) and seasonality and variability associated with them. The study is based on secondary data collected from www.agmarknet.gov.in. Data was collected for the period March 2009 to March 2019, and the analysis was done based on that. Linear trend in arrival and nominal prices were found to be positive across the markets, however for real prices, it was found negative except Bangalore (` 5.50/q per annum). CAGR for arrival in all the four markets were found positive, and for real prices it was negative in most of the months. The main season of arrival of potato in different markets was December to March, and for prices index is highest during the off season. Variability in arrival is highest in Agra market and in price variability is highest in Azadpur market.

Cumin production of Rajasthan and Jodhpur were kept a dominant position in Seed spices economy of the country. This study was attempt to present the comparative performance of cumin in Rajasthan and Jodhpur. For drawing a meaningful termination of Agri-Export Zones on cumin production in Rajasthan, the selected study period from 1991-92 to 2018-19 was divided into three sub-periods as Ex-ante Agri-Export Zone (1991-92 to 2004-05), Ex-post Agri-Export Zone (2005-06 to 2018-19) and overall study period (1991-92 to 2018-19). The results of the growth analysis revealed that area, yield and production of cumin in Jodhpur was increased faster than Rajasthan and period-I. In case of instability, the production and yield of this crop in period-II were more instable than other two periods in Rajasthan and Jodhpur. The introduction of high yielding varieties has boosted up production Rajasthan especially in Jodhpur. During period-I the growth of output was contributed mainly due to increasing area under the crop. However, in period-II development of high yielding varieties have positive and significant effect on expanding production in Jodhpur and Rajasthan.

India exports spices from times ancient and is the largest producer, consumer and exporter of spices in the world. This study is contemplated during the two time periods viz., Pre NHM (1993-94 to 2004-05) and Post NHM (2005-06 to 2017-18). The overall trend in spices export in quantity was found to be lower in the Period I than in Period II and Period III. It implies that a lower growth rate in quantity (4.75%) of spices were being exported during Period-I, which increased in quantity (9.57%) of spices during Period-II. Highly stable market for spices and its products during Period I were oils & oleoresins and curry powder, in Period II chilli (quantity), mint products (quantity), oils & oleoresins (value) and curry powder (quantity and value). No commodity showed low instability during Period III. (1993-94 to 2017-2018).

The research empirically determined rice yield differentials between the IFAD participating and non-participating farmers in Nigeria’s Niger state. A field survey data of 2018 cropping season collected through structured questionnaire complemented with interview schedule from 111 participants and 185 non-participants sampled via a multistage sampling technique were used. The collected data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, profit function and inferential statistics. The empirical findings showed that the participating farmers are efficient in managing their enterprise risk owing to low cost of production and high yield. In addition, the programme had impact on the farmers’ productivity both in the short-run and long-run, thus the reason for the high yield in comparison to their counterparts. Furthermore, the decomposition analysis justified the impact of the programme as structural difference called programme participation accounts for more than 92% variation in the yield of the participating farmers been higher than that of the non-participating farmers, leaving less than 10% to be contributed by resource endowment difference. Therefore, the study advised the participating farmers to increase their insurance coverage and adjust their structural pattern of production as a risk management strategy so as to enhance their chances of breaking even in rice production. In addition, the programme should be broaden to cover the non-treated groups so as to enhance the livelihood and rice food security of the farming households in particular; and that of the rural, state and national economies in general.

Awareness on proper nutrition, nutritional value of food and healthy practices in food intake can build a difference in farm women productivity. Poor dietary practice is one of the biggest global contributing factors on recurrent disease in farm women. Negative effects of malnutrition among women were compounded by heavy farm work demands and poverty, although technological breakthrough brought tremendous scope in agriculture sector. Under this backdrop, this study was conducted with the objectives to gauge the nutritional awareness and dietary practices by farm women. The study was conducted among 150 farm women of Bhagalpur district of Bihar. From this research, it can be concluded that mass media, social media, and grassroots extension functionaries play pivotal role in creation of nutritional awareness among farm women. The mostly dietary practices included cereals (Rice, Wheat & Maize) and farm women nutritional awareness is significantly correlated with age, education level and mass media exposure of farm women.

This paper examined the trend in Asian rice production, role of rice in human nutrition and documents structure of rice market in major Asian Countries, by analyzing supply demand and trade scenarios for the fast five decades. Country wise data from FAOSTAT and WTO were collected for the past five decades, to analyze key issues related to rice sector with special focus on rice markets in Asia. Rice Area and production has been increased significantly at higher rate than the population growth rate in Asia over the past fifty years. This resulted in increase of per capita availability of rice and contributed significantly to nutrition security. However, there are wide imbalances in supply-demand across Asian countries .Thus rice trade has become a major global economic activity in the recent past. The structural changes in global rice markets are discussed in detail in the paper.

The present study analysed the impact of trade policies on coconut economy of Kerala based on the secondary data from Coconut Development Board (CDB) and Export-Import data bank of Government of India. Exponential growth function, Cuddy- Della instability index and Revealed Symmetric Comparative Advantage (RSCA) were used to compute the growth rates, instability indices and comparative advantage, respectively. Though trade liberalization adversely affected the coconut farmers during the initial phase of liberalization, it subsequently increased the opportunities of the Indian coconut sector to compete in the world market. Compared to Period I (1980-81 to 1993-94), a significant improvement in the coconut export was observed during Period II (1994-95 to 2007-08) and Period III (2008-09 to 2016-17). The high growth rates of coconut products together with low instability indices in the export revealed the prospects for Indian coconut sector in the global market during the post liberalization period. The value of RSCA revealed that India lacked any comparative advantage of coconut export in Period I. While in Period II, the export of coconut and copra possessed a comparative advantage from 2002 and 2005, respectively, and maintained the comparative advantage throughout the Period III. The result indicated that India must give much effort to increase the export share of coconut, copra and other value-added coconut products to augment the foreign earnings.

India has not only achieved self-sufficiency in food production but also enhanced its ability to deal with inter year fluctuations in production. Despite the much commended economic growth of the country, the average calorie consumption in India has declined over the years and has been low in comparison to international standards. Hilly states in particular, confront multiple food insecurity risks owing to many reasons like dominance of traditional agriculture, low yields of food and cash crops, and lack of market incentives, etc. Three northern hilly states namely; Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand constitute the Himalayan belt of India. Out of the three hilly states Uttarakhand was purposively selected for the study due to higher below poverty line (BPL) percentage (RBI, 2012) and the higher rank (6th rank) in the development disability index (NIPFP report, 2013) than the other two states. The present study assessed the existing food security status of the state over the National Sample Survey Organization (NSSO) rounds and measured inequality in calorie intake across various income groups. The study utilized unit record data on household consumption expenditure surveys extracted from CDs for two rounds viz., 61st round (2004-05) & 68th round (2011-12) conducted by NSSO. The state was first categorized into two regions viz., hill and plain region. Households in either region were further classified into different quartiles on the basis of their monthly per consumer unit expenditure and across these quartiles the information was obtained. To assess the incidence, depth and severity of food insecurity Foster, Greer and Thorbecke-FGT (1984) class of poverty measures was used Inequality in calorie intake among different expenditure class was calculated through Gini coefficient. Results revealed that despite a noticeable decline in the share of food expenditure till 68th round it was still more than 50% among people of lower income group (LIG) in plains and LIG and lower middle income group (LMIG) in hills. At an overall level hilly region fared well in terms of calorie intake than plain region of the state in each round. The head count index of food insecurity showed that the incidence of food insecurity in plains came down to 52% in 68th round from 61% of 61st round and 39% from 46% in hills during the same period. A considerable difference in dietary pattern when viewed in terms milk and milk products consumption, edible oils, fruits, vegetables and sugars was observed across income groups. The head count index of food insecurity in 61st round showed that 61% households in Plains and 46% households in hills were food insecure, this incidence of food insecurity came down to 52% in plains and 39% in hill region till 68th round. Inequality in plain region was lower in each round, when compared to that in hilly region. A targeted monitoring to ensure food availability through PDS to lower income population can be done and range of food products can be increased for this particular target group.

Pulses are important constituent in the food basket of people of Assam. The state produces 107.5 thousand tonnes of total pulse from an area of 146.4 thousand hectare with yield rate of 735kg/ha (2016-17). The present production is able to meet only 20 per cent of the present requirement. The major pulses grown in the state are gram, arhar, greengram, lentil, blackgram and pea. A study conducted with the objective of analysing the supply demand gap of pulses in Assam, it was found that there was huge gap in requirement and supply of most of the pulses except black gram and pea and the deficit continues upto 2025, as well. The government has been trying to increase the pulses production with increase area and enhanced yield through various schemes namely NFSM-Pulse. Bringing more pulse area under irrigation, adoption of recommended production technology is expected to increase the yield that might help in bridging the demand supply gap. As blackgram was found to be surplus, the people of Assam should gradually replace lentil with blackgram as dal. Establishment of mini dal processing plant might attract the youth to grow and process pulse and thereby increase the employment opportunity and enhanced production in the state.

The present investigation was undertaken to study marketing costs, margins and price spread and problems faced by green chilli cultivators in marketing of green chilli. A multistage purposive and random sampling procedure was used to select district, tehsils, villages and farmers from the district. A sample of 57 farmers i.e., 10 percent for each category of each village was taken for the study. Muhana mandi was selected purposively for studying the nature and magnitude of costs and margins in the marketing of green chilli in Jaipur. From the market, 5 village traders, 10 wholesalers-cum-commission agents and 15 retailers were selected for study. Marketing costs, margin and price spread were estimated by using costs incurred by intermediaries, absolute margin, percentage margin and constraints in marketing of green chilli were measured by Garrett’s ranking method. Results revealed that the farmers adopted three kinds of marketing channels; channel-I (Producer → Village trader → Wholesaler-cum-commission agent → Retailer → Consumer), channel-II (Producer → Wholesaler-cum-commission agent → Retailer → Consumer) and channel-III (Producer → Consumer). Total marketing costs in sale of green chilli was ` 500.40 and ` 491.34 per quintal in channel-I and channel-II, respectively in the study area. Marketing margins of wholesaler-cum commission agent was ` 205.89 and ` 289.05 per quintal by retailer. Producer’s share in consumer’s rupee in sale of green chilli was 69.68 per cent, 74.02 per cent and 100 per cent in village, regulated market and in direct sale to consumer. The key problems of chilli farmers in marketing of green chilli were low price of green chilli, lack of good storage facilities, fluctuations in market price, difficulty in maintaining quality standards and high transportation cost etc. For the lucrative production, the productivity of the crop needs to increase and price stabilization of the green chilli and elimination of market intermediaries may be induced.

Chickpea (Cicer arientinum) is known in India since ancient times, and In Asia and Europe chickpea is said to be one of the oldest pulses known and cultivated. The On farm Benefits of the chickpea in Rajasthan with reference to Gangour (GNG 1581) variety was evaluated in this study. The evaluation was based on a household survey of chickpea grower in 4 villages of Bikaner District of Rajasthan. To evaluate on farm benefits of the chickpea in Rajasthan with reference to Gangour (GNG 1581) variety the cost of cultivation concept and simple statistical tools were used. Extra revenue generation estimated is ` 760 crores per year in case of Gangour (GNG 1581) variety. Labor productivity was higher for Gangour (GNG 1581) (0. 74q/day), and lower for the local variety (0.44q/day).

Climate change influences crop yield vis-a-vis crop production to a greater extent in Bihar. Climate change and its impacts are well recognizing today and it will affect both physical and biological system. Therefore, this study has been planned to assess the effect of climate variables on yield of major crops, adaptation measures undertaken in Samastipur district of Bihar. Secondary data on yield of maize and wheat crops were collected for the period from 1999-2019 to describe the effects of climate variable namely rainfall, maximum and minimum temperature on yield of maize and wheat. Analysis of time series data on climate variables indicated that annual rainfall was positively related to yields while maximum and minimum temperature had a negative but significant impact on maize and wheat yields. It actually revealed that other factors, such as; type of soil, soil fertility and method of farming may also be responsible for crop yield. Trend in cost as well as income of farmers indicated that income and cost of cultivation has no significant relationship with climate variable. On the basis of above observation it may be concluded that level of income of farmers changed due to change in the other factors rather than change in climatic variable over the period under study as cost of cultivation increases with increased in the price of input over the period but not due to change in climatic variable.

The present study was carried out in the erstwhile Mahabubnagar district of Telangana, the major producer of pigeon pea among pulses, which lies in the rain shadow area of the state and suffers from frequent droughts. The rainfall in the district is fluctuating. Further revealed that about 70 percent of farmers expressed that change in climatic conditions has reduced pigeon pea yield and 28 percent farmers opined that it reduced output and the quality seed, 87 percent are interested in an alternate crop as a coping up mechanism in complete failure of crop. The significant change in climate as per farmer’s perception is the erratic distribution of rainfall with the highest Garrett Score of 76.66, followed by a delay in monsoon,which scored 69.54. The suggestions of the farmers when ranked to face the extreme climate conditions given in the order are,the dissemination of knowledge on contingent crops,loans for second crop and waiver of earlier loans, early settlement of crop insurance, High yielding early duration pigeon pea varieties to escape terminal moisture stress, sufficient quantities of quality seed on subsidy for the second crop in case of failure of crop in initial stages.

Onion (Allium cepa L.) is one of the important commercial vegetable crops grown in India. The present study was conducted in Nuh district of Haryana on the basis of highest production of onion among other districts of the state. The block named Tauru was selected for sampling and a total of thirty onion farmers from various villages in this block were selected randomly. The primary data for the agriculture year 2017-18 were collected by personal interviews of the selected farmers with the help of specially designed schedule. The results of the study revealed that the major problems faced by the onion farmers in production were observed high cost of pesticide (93.33%), lack of knowledge about recommended fertilizer doses (86.67%), high cost of fertilizer (83.33%), lack of knowledge about the control measures for various pests and diseases (83.33%), difficulty in identifying the pests and diseases (80.00%) and lack of knowledge about seed/seedling treatment (76.67%). As for as marketing of onion is concerned, 83.33 per cent of respondents opined that high cost of transportation, absence of minimum support prices (83.33%), existence of large number of intermediaries in marketing process (83.33%) and too much fluctuation in prices (80.00%). The problems related to processing expressed by onion growers 80.00 per cent of the respondents reported the problem of technical manpower, higher charges of power and fuels (73.33%), fluctuation in raw material and procurement (73.33%) and lack of good quality packaging material (66.67%).

The study calculated technical efficiency, Data Envelopment Analysis technique was employed, one of the non-parametric linear programing techniques to estimate the farm level technical efficiency of paddy production in Andhra Pradesh. This secondary data set contained 541 paddy producing farms/units across Andhra Pradesh state under five agro climatic zones viz North coastal, Godavari, Krishna, Southern and Scarce rainfall zones was studied. The results showed that the overall technical efficiency of the entire sample is 86.8 per cent inferring that about 13 per cent of the potential paddy yield is lost because of technical inefficiency in Andhra Pradesh. The yield gap was found to be 981.10 kg/ha in Godavari zone and a minimum yield gap of 335 kg/ha in North coastal zone with an average yield gap of 663 kg/ha for Andhra Pradesh indicating domestic paddy production could be significantly increased only by improving farmers practices with the current amount of resource they are using. The study suggested that there should be exposure to the improved technologies, frequent trainings and experience sharing mechanisms with efficient resource management practices.

The present investigation was undertaken with a view to studying the costs and returns structure by the contract and non-contract farmers under contract farming of bottle gourd. Primary data were collected for the agricultural year 2015-16. The cost concepts were used. The results of the study revealed that all types of incomes viz., gross income, family labour income, farm business income and net income were higher on the contract farms than on the non-contract farms. The net income per hectare from bottle gourd was 31.69 per cent higher on the contract farms as compared to the non-contract farms. The total costs were higher on contract farms than on non-contract farms. The net profit was higher on contract farms than on non-contract farms. Returns per rupee were higher on contract farms (` 1.82) than non-contract farms (`1.69).

A study was conducted in Rajouri and Kishtwar districts of Jammu region of J&K to assess the contribution of non-timber forest products (NTFPs) towards farmers’ economy in North-Western Himalayas. Anardana and Kalazeera were the important forest NTFPs collected by the farmers of Rajouri and Kishtwar districts, respectively for commercial purpose. Four major blocks of Rajouri namely Doongi, Rajouri, Kalakote and Manjakote and two major blocks of Kishtwar namely Nagseni and Paddar were selected purposively, as the areas earmarked maximum extraction of mentioned NTFPs. Fifteen farmers were selected randomly from each block constituting a sample of 60 farmers from district Rajouri and 30 farmers from district Kishtwar. The average cost of collection of Anardana & Kalazeera was ` 414.16 and ` 1106.67, respectively. The overall gross and net income from Anardana was ` 7,588.33 and ` 5,228.33 per kg with cost benefit ratio of 3.34. The overall gross and net income from Kalazeera was ` 20,566.67 and ` 17,863.33 per kg with cost benefit ratio of 7.94. The percentage share of Anardana to total farm income in Rajouri district was 8.99 per cent, whereas it was 49.45 per cent for Kalazeera in Kishtwar district. The overall share of NTFPs to farm income was 24.11 per cent. The farmer’s income from NTFPs was significantly determined by total annual household income of the family, total time spent on gathering NTFPs and farm income at 5 per cent level of significance. Non-availability of labour was the major problem reported in collection of Anardana, whereas in case of Kalazeera, difficulty in harvesting the seeds was the major problem. The marketing system and market intelligence for NTFPs is urgently required for optimal use of natural resources and enhancing the income of farmers in North-Western Himalayas.

The study was conducted in North of Bengaluru with an aim to analyze effect of urbanization on production diversity, farm income and factors influencing the same across the rural-urban interface. The required data was collected randomly from 80 farmers each under rural, transition and urban gradients. Multiple linear regression was used to determine the drivers of farm income. Herfindahl index was employed to capture the extent of production diversification. Results revealed that the rural farmers diversified from food crops to vegetable and flower crops over the years. Whereas, farmers of transition and urban gradients chose to grow high value horticulture crops instead of food crops. During 2019, the extent of diversification was more in transition (0.21) and rural (0.25) gradients compared to urban (0.29) gradient. In rural gradients, the major share of farm income was from cereals (31.79 %) followed by vegetables (28.65 %) and perennials (17.88 %) in 2014 but the major share was replaced by vegetables (28.69 %) and flower crops (19.98) in 2019. In transition and urban gradients, the major source of farm income was from vegetables in 2014 which was later substituted by fruit crops in 2019. Over the period of five years, the percentage increase in average farm income of households was highest in urban gradient (143.07 %) followed by rural (140.15 %) and transition (110.50 %) gradients. Land holding size, education, borrowed capital and investment in farming emerged as the principal determinants of farm income. As a whole, the study concludes that, urbanization led investment on high value crops through crop diversification which played a significant role in augmenting the farm income.