ABSTRACT
The Union of India exemplifies all the food problems of Asia, also shows the way to their solution. The difficulty begins with the statistics. These have been collected for many years, but P. C. Mahalanobis has recently criticized them drastically. Food crops amount to about 262 million acres and cash crops to about 20 million. The total is greater than the sown area of land because some of it carries two crops a year. The chief factor determining crop distribution is the water supply. Rice, jute and tea require most water and are therefore found in the regions of high rainfall, or in the case of rice, of adequate irrigation. The quantities of food produced during the last ten or fifteen years have changed but little while the population has been steadily increasing. Pakistan is divided into two parts: East and West Pakistan; a thousand miles of unfriendly country separates them and rapid personal intercourse is possible only by air.
