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The Decline of Cultivators and Rise of Agricultural Labourers in the Rural Areas of Himachal Pradesh

Anay Kumar*, Mohan Lal

Research Scholar (PH.D. in Economics), Sant Baba Bhag Singh University, Jalandhar (Pb)

Abstract: The study of the decline of cultivators and rise of agricultural labourers in the rural areas of Himachal Pradesh is done by using the methodology of percentage and compound annual growth rate for the decade 2000-01 to 2010-11. In the decade 2000-01 to 2010-11, the number of cultivators in the agricultural workers of Himachal Pradesh declined by 7.40% from 65.33% to 57.93% and the number of agricultural labourers in the agricultural workers of Himachal Pradesh increased by 1.7% from 3.15% to 4.92%. In non-agricultural activities are recorded a slight decrease of 0.13% in Himachal Pradesh Households industry which come down from 1.76% to 1.63%. Apart from this, other workers of Himachal Pradesh have registered a significant increase of 5.73% which has increased from the decade 2000-01 to 2010-11. In this paper an attempt has been made to know about the effects of other workers on performance of agricultural workers on Himachal Pradesh. This study is based on secondary data and data collected from reliable sources of the Government of Himachal Pradesh.

Keywords: cultivators, agricultural labourers, rural areas, other workers, agriculture and non-agricultural activities

Received September 02, 2022; Revised October 04, 2022; Accepted October 13, 2022

Citation: Anay Kumar, Mohan Lal, The Decline of Cultivators and Rise of Agricultural Labourers in the Rural Areas of Himachal Pradesh. Journal of Finance and Economics, 10 (3). 62-67. January 2022. doi:10.12691/jfe-10-3-2

1. Introduction

Agriculture is the largest and most important sector in the economic life of Himachal Pradesh. Being the single largest industry and main occupation of the people of the state, agriculture has a special place in the prosperity and development of the state. It meets the needs of food grains though the increase in income as well as in population. It also supplies raw material for many consumer goods like edible oil, sugar, textiles etc. Agriculture can make a big contribution in earning foreign exchange. The export requirement can be easily met by adding one or two crops to the existing pattern and that too with little incentive and probably without any additional capital investment. But it needs to be noted that dependence on agricultural produce alone should not be adopted as a long-term goal, as there is always the possibility of stiff competition from other developing and less developed countries. Agriculture can also contribute to the country's growing need for large capital resources [1]. Jha, B. (2006) says that the agricultural sector in India accounts for about 60.00 % of the total employment in India. In the agricultural sector, 97.00 % of the workers are from rural areas. The growth rate of agricultural employment is very low (0.006 %) and was negligible during the 1990s.The agricultural sector almost stopped absorbing most of the labor into it and it was found that a mix of both push and pull factors are responsible for these changes in employment in the agricultural sector [2]. Reddy et al. (2014) attempted to assess the changing structure of rural production and employment over the past two decades and its impact on the rural labor market. They found that there has been a profound structural change in the rural labor market with the shift from agricultural to non-agricultural activities in the rural labor market. Currently, the non-farm sector is no longer a residual sector, but an emerging driver of rural growth and change, contributing 65% to rural net domestic product in 2010. There has been an absolute decline in the labor force in recent times. This decline in agricultural employment is much greater for both male and female workers and female workers compared to male workers in the agricultural sector [3]. Subathra, C. (2015) Analyzing Census data from the Government of India, the number of farmers in the country has declined by 9 million since 2001. "Cultivators", as the Indian government describes farmers who are increasingly scarce, are actually more agricultural laborers – census results show a decline of about 9 million in farmers and an increase in agricultural labor by about 38 million. Over a period of 10 years, the number of cultivators declined by about 8.7 lakh and the number of agricultural workers increased by about 9.7 lakh. "The increase in agricultural labor can be explained by the decreasing size of land holdings over time [4]." Subramaniam, S. (2015) analyzed that the present study presents various trends and patterns emerging from the Indian rural economy. It aims to study the change in workforce patterns of the agricultural sector. A study of change in the direction of agricultural workforce changes and traces the process of structural change in Indian agriculture. He relies only on census data to draw various conclusions using very simple statistical and graphical techniques. The study traces out four important phenomena, i.e. rural labour. Marginalization of agriculture, feminization of agriculture, increasing importance of agriculture for various ancillary activities, and finally the ongoing structural changes in the rural economy. The emergence of these events has various relations with respect to the future trends of Indian agriculture [5]. Gupta, N. (2016) found in his study that the proportion of working population in India increased from 39.1% in 2001 to 39.8% in 2011. He studied the decade of 2001-2011 and found that there was a decline in the number of cultivators and a huge increase in the number of agricultural laborers, which hinders the development of India. For the first time after independence, the number of agricultural laborers has exceeded the number of cultivators. There has been a slight increase in the number of Household industry workers but a high increase in the number of other workers [6]. Nitu and Singh (2016) examine agro-based livelihood security in the changing socio-economic environment in Kangra district of Himachal Pradesh. In Kangra, about 45% of the workforce is dependent on agriculture and agricultural laborers constitute 8% of the total workforce. There has been a slow growth of employment opportunities in other sectors, mainly in the secondary and tertiary sectors, to absorb the surplus labor force from the agricultural sector. The district has the largest number of cultivators i.e. 0.3 million out of 20 lakh farmers in the state and about 60% of the households depend on livestock for their additional income as well as other non-agricultural sources [7]. Kusuma and Basavaraju (2017) have observed that the percentage of agricultural laborers increased from 16.65% to 28.74% during the period 1961 to 1991, although it decreased slightly to 25.4% in 2011 and the annual growth rate (AGR) of agricultural laborers increased. There has been a significant decrease of -3.78% from 60.30% during this period. It is clear that the share of agricultural laborers has registered a negative growth. This means that agricultural laborers have shifted from agriculture to the non-agriculture sector due to frequent crop failures, low wage rates, rising cost of production, the effects of globalization and low or no minimum support prices for farmers [8]. Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare (2020) According to the 2011 census conducted by the Registrar General of India, the total number of agricultural workers in the country has increased from 234.1 million (127.3 million cultivators and 106.8 million agricultural labourers) in 2001 to 263.1 million (118.8 million cultivators and 144.3 million agricultural labourers) in 2011. Although, the share of the workforce engaged in the agriculture sector (including cultivators and agricultural labourers) declined from 58.2 % in 2001 to 54.6 % in 2011. Migration of agricultural labourers from rural areas to urban areas is a common phenomenon and development is a natural part of the process. The reasons for this change include, inter alia, better employment opportunities in industry and services, increasing urbanization and lower income in agriculture [9].

2. Objectives of the Study

The particular objectives of the study are as follows:

1. To Study the Percentage of Agricultural workers in rural areas of Himachal Pradesh.

2. To find out the various causes for occupational change and its growth by Cultivators and agricultural labourers in rural areas of Himachal Pradesh.

3. Suggestion for the upliftment of cultivators in rural areas of Himachal Pradesh.

3. Methodology of the Study

This study is based on secondary data and data collected from different reliable sources such as Census of India, Statistical Abstract of Himachal Pradesh, Economic survey of Himachal Pradesh, and Statistical Outline of Himachal Pradesh. For the calculation of change in rural population and agricultural workers extensive use of percentages has been made. The compound annual growth rate has been calculated to the study the rate of change in the rural population and agricultural workers in Himachal Pradesh. It has been calculated by the following formula:

4. Results and Discussion

Himachal Pradesh is only a state in the country whose 89.96% (Table 1) population (census 2011) lives in rural areas and this sector provides direct employment to about 62.85% (cultivators and agricultural Labourers) of agricultural workers of the state. A perusal of Table 1 exhibits that at the state level the growth rate of rural population at an average was 1.265%. However, at the district level no uniformity was witnessed in the growth rate. In some districts, it was recorded more than the growth rate of state level and in some districts, it was below the state level. In district of Solan, rural population was 1.681% followed by district Una 1.649%. Apart from this, it was 1.328% in Chamba and 1.188% in Bilaspur. However in the district of Lahual-Spiti, growth rate of rural population was witnessed negative. It is due to geographically condition of district and migration of rural population towards other districts of the state.

Table 1. Decadal Growth Rate of Rural Population

Rural Population as a Percentage of Total Population

An attempt has been made Table 2 to elaborate the changes in the state of Himachal Pradesh during the period 2000-01 to 2010-11. A perusal of Table 2 shows that the share of the cultivators in the rural population of Himachal Pradesh has reduced from 35.66 % in 2000-01 to 33.39 % in 2010-11. This down ward trend was witnessed due to the migration of cultivators to non-agricultural sector. The migration of cultivators took place due to several reasons like small size of operational holding, division of ancestral land, agricultural employment shift to non-agricultural employment and increase of wages. However, the share of agricultural labourers has also increased from 1.72% in 2000-01 to 2.83% in 2010-11. The share of Household Industry in rural population of Himachal Pradesh has reduced to 0.96% in 2000-01 from 0.94% in 2010-11. But, the share of Other Workers in rural population of Himachal Pradesh has increased from 16.25% in 2000-01 to 20.46 % in 2010-11.

Table 2. Agricultural Workers as a percentage of rural population

Agricultural Workers as a percentage of rural population

A perusal of Table 3 shows that the share of the cultivators in Agricultural workers of Himachal Pradesh has declined to 57.93% in 2010-11 from 65.33% in 2000-01. This down ward trend was witnessed due to the migration of cultivators from agricultural sector to non-agricultural sector. However, the share of agricultural labourers have also increased to 4.92% in 2010-11 from 3.15% in 2000-01. The share of Household Industry in total workers of Himachal Pradesh has come down to 1.63% in 2010-11 from 1.76% in 2000-01. But, the share of Other Workers in agricultural workers of Himachal Pradesh has increased to 35.50% in 2010-11 from 29.77% in 2000-01.

Table 3. Share of Cultivators, Agricultural Labourers, Household Industry and Other Workers in Agricultural Workers

Table 4 shows that at the state level the growth rate of cultivators at an average was 0.548%. However, at the district level no uniformity was witnessed in the growth rate. In some districts, it was recorded more than the growth rate of state level and in some districts it was below the state level. In district of Kullu, Cultivators was 1.974% followed by district Mandi 1.775%. Apart from this, it was 1.735% in Chamba and 1.322% in Sirmaur. However in the district of Una, Kangra and Solan, the growth rate of Cultivators was witnessed negative (Table 4). Regarding the growth of agricultural labour in Himachal Pradesh, the highest growth rate has been recorded in district Chamba (45.547%), followed by Hamirpur (16.813%), Shimla (16.609%), Mandi (14.274%), and Kinnaur (13.043%), Kullu (12.132%), Sirmaur (8.606) which was even higher than the State average growth rate (8.587%). Compound Annual Growth Rates for the Agricultural Labour which were lower than the State average were recorded for the districts of Una (7.303%), Lahual-Spiti (6.873%), Solan (6.299%), Bilaspur (4.157%), Kangra (3.869%).The highest compound annual rate of growth for Household Industry has been recorded in Sirmaur (10.474%) followed by Shimla (8.140%), Chamba (6.263%), Solan (5.099%), Lahual Spiti (2.279%), Hamirpur (1.478%) which was higher than the State’s compound annual growth rate. Further, it has been observed that Kinnaur, Mandi, Kullu,Bilaspur, Una and Kangra have recorded lower compound annual rate of growth as compared to State’s compound annual rate of growth (1.078%) in Household Industry.The highest compound annual rate of growth for Other Workers has been recorded in Kangra (5.489%) followed by Bilaspur (5.381%), Una (5.107%), Hamirpur (4.850%), Sirmaur (4.502%), Mandi (4.501%), Chamba (4.318%) which was higher than the State’s compound annual growth rate (4.183%). Moreover, it has been observed that Kullu, Kinnaur, Solan, Shimla and Lahual -Spiti have recorded lower compound annual rate of growth as compared to State’s compound annual rate of growth (4.183%) in Other Workers (Table 4).

Table 4. Compound Annual Growth Rate in agricultural workers (Average Growth Rate)

Compound Annual Growth Rate in agricultural workers (Average Growth Rate)

5. Conclusion and Suggestions

It is observed that the share of total population of Himachal Pradesh in rural population has declined by 0.24% in the decade 2000-01(90.20%) and 2010-11 (89.96%) and recorded an average growth rate of 1.265% (see Table 1). In addition, the share of Cultivators in the rural population declined by 2.27% in the decades 2000-01 (35.66%) and 2010-11 (33.39%) (see Table 2), recording an average growth rate of 0.548% (see Table 4). The share of agricultural labourers in the rural population rise by 2.11% in the decades 2000-01 (1.72%) and 2010-11 (3.83%) (see Table 2), recording an average growth rate of 8.587% (see Table 4). In the decade 2000-01 to 2010-11, the number of cultivators in agricultural workers of Himachal Pradesh declined by 7.40% from 65.33% to 57.33% and the number of agricultural labourers increased by 1.7% from 3.15% to 4.92% (see Table 3). In non-agricultural activities is recorded a slight decrease of 0.13% in Himachal Pradesh Households industry which come down from 1.76% to 1.63%. Apart from this, other workers of Himachal Pradesh have registered a significant increase of 5.73% which has increased from 29.77% to 35.50% (see Table 3). Moreover, the average growth rate of agricultural workers (CL-0.548%, AL- 8.587%, HH- 1.078% and OW- 4.183%) has shown in rural areas of Himachal Pradesh (see Table 4). Himachal Pradesh is a hilly region, where the size of the fields is getting smaller due to the division of ancestral land on the one hand and on the other hand the fields are being plowed with tractors instead of bullocks. This is the reason why cultivators are leaving agriculture and emphasizing on non-agricultural activities. Therefore, the government should encourage the cultivators from time to time about the scheme related to land consolidation so that the cultivators can increase the size of their fields.

References

[1]   | Balokhra, Jag Mohan. (2007). The Wonderland of Himachal Pradesh: An Encyclopedia. H.G. Publications (India), New Delhi, pp 921-922.
[2]   | Jha, Brijesh (2006). Employment, Wages and Productivity in Indian Agriculture, Institute of Economic Growth, University of Delhi Enclave North Complex, Delhi, Website : www.iegindia.org.
[3]   | Reddy, DN, Reddy Amarender A, Nagaraj N and Bantilan C. (2014). Rural Non-Farm Employment and Rural Transformation in India: Working Paper Series No. 57. Patancheru 502 324, Telangana, India: International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics. pp.28.
[4]   | Subathra, C. (2015), Scenario of cultivators and Agricultural Laborers-A Study, international journal of research,vol.2(10), October, pp. 1133-1139.
[5]   | S Subramanian, S. (2015) Emerging Trends and Patterns of India's Agricultural Workforce: Evidence from the Census, The institute for social and Economic change, Bangalore pp 1-17.
[6]   | Gupta, N. (2016. Decline of Cultivators and Growth of Agricultural Labourers in India from 2001 to 2011, International Journal of Rural Management, Vol.12, No,2, pp 179-198.
[7]   | Nitu and Singh, R.B. (2016). Dynamics of hill agriculture in emergent rural economy of Kangra district, Himachal Pradesh, Journal of Soil and Water Conservation 15(4), pp 337-344, October-December.
[8]   | Kusuma, K M and Basavaraju, K C (2017). An Analysis of Agricultural Labour Scenario in Karnataka, International Journal of Research in Economics and Social Sciences (IJRESS) Available online at: http://euroasiapub.org Vol. 7 Issue 9, September- 2017, pp 209-219 .
[9]   | Ministry of Agriculture & Farmers Welfare (2020). Agrarian Land, Posted On: 04 Feb., 5:51PM.by PIB Delhi.
[10]   | Census of India, 2001 and 2011, H.P.
[11]   | Statistical Abstract of Himachal Pradesh, Department of Economics and Statistics Himachal Pradesh, Shimla.
[12]   | Statistical outline of Himachal Pradesh, Department of Economics and Statistics Himachal Pradesh, Shimla.
[13]   | Economic Survey of Himachal Pradesh, Department of Economics and Statistics Himachal Pradesh, Shimla.