ABSTRACT
India has to be virtually self-sufficient in feeding its population of over 900 million. In the past, through failures of distribution, and reluctance to accept foreign assistance, some areas have suffered serious famines. For the last twenty years this problem has largely been overcome. In some respects Indian agriculture has been successful, but in other respects results have been disappointing. The yields of the principal cereals grown-rice, wheat, millet and sorghum-are usually well below the world average and far below the highest yields achieved in the world. Although the consump-
BOX 14.1 Hinduism
From the point of view of this book two aspects of Hinduism are particularly important. First, the parti-tioning of British South Asia in 1947 was made primarily on the basis of religion. Second, the beliefs of Hindus have some bearing on their life styles and on their attitudes to society and the environment. Table 14.6 shows the approximate percentages of believers in the main faiths of the region of South Asia. It shows that among India’s neighbours only Nepal is predominantly Hindu, Pakistan and Bangladesh are predominantly Muslim countries, Sri Lanka and Myanmar Buddhist.
