ABSTRACT
The technological innovations in paddy cultivation dating from the late 1960s in India are generally taken to include the use of HYVs, inputs of chemical fertilisers, improved cultural practices and the mechanisation of agricultural operations. Reports from agricultural research stations claim that an optimum package of these inputs leads to substantial increases in rice yields. More recently, following the oil crisis and subsequent fertiliser shortage, it has been claimed that an increase in the area sown with HYV seed, with low or even zero fertiliser inputs, would lead to increases in rice yields. Given the urgent need to increase rice production in India it is essential that the performance of this technology and the constraints on its spread be studied — not only in regions with assured water supply and high, stable yields (these contribute about 31 per cent to the area and 37 per cent to the production of foodgrains in India and include the much studied IADP Districts, see pp. 30-2), but in the more common and less studied regions which depend mainly on rainfall, are subject to periodic droughts, and produce medium and less stable yields (contributing 42 per cent to both the area and production of foodgrains); and again, in the rest of the cropped areas with low rainfall and unstable, low yields (classification of regions in these three categories as by Sen, 1967). Rice is confined mainly to the first two categories of region. The survey area in North Arcot District belongs to the second category.
