An economic analysis of food grains production in TamilNadu ascertaining food security

Food security has a major objective in India since the beginning of planning era. India's food grains production was 82 MT in 1960-61 reached to about 280 MT in 2017-18. It had increased at the rate of 2.78 per cent during this period which is a significant achievement (The Times of India, 2018). With this background, a study on food grains production in Tamil Nadu would help in finding out red signals of agriculture. It was revealed that area and production of food grains exhibited a negative growth rate. Among the cereals, the decline in growth was observed in area in the case of paddy, sorghum, pearl millet and ragi and in production of the aforesaid crops except paddy. Among the food grains, instability in area was observed in the case of total cereals and in production of pulses, more in maize as compared to other cereals. The growth rates shown the declining trend in area and production warrant confined focus on research on variety and management technologies also for harnessing created through distribution of quality seeds. The slow growth of agriculture and steady growth of population calls for the second green revolution, especially in the dry areas, to develop measures to overcome environmental, technological and institutional fatigue. High technology input models are facing challenges due to unsustainable use of resources, pressure of environment and inability to address the needs of small farmers and this fact has to be taken into consideration by development authorities, planners and policymakers.