ABSTRACT

Following the technological breakthroughs in the mid-1960s, subsistence agriculture in Punjab was transformed into a market-oriented operation. The growth of the rapidly progressing agricultural economy levelled out over time in terms of profits because of the rising cost of cultivation and stagnant productivity. The liberalisation of the economy in the 1990s provided ideological support to free trade and minimised state intervention in economic activities. As a result, downsizing of the public sector and reducing subsidies became key issues. Public-sector investment in agriculture and allied activities has declined continuously in India. The percentage of the budget that was spent on agriculture was 14.9 per cent during the First Five-Year Plan (1951–56). It declined to 12.3 per cent during the Fifth Plan (1974–79), and further to 3.7 per cent during the Eleventh Plan (2007–12).