Essence of crop diversification: A study of West Bengal agriculture

This study deals with the study of the diversification of agricultural activities of the West Bengal, one of the leading agricultural state in India. Using the Minhas and Parikh substitution and expansion effects methodology this study revealed that the cropping pattern in West Bengal in terms of allocation of acreage had been skewed towards food grain. However, during the last fifteen to twenty years some important crops (boro rice, potato, oilseeds, especially mustard) emerged as the main crop for the farmers. The cropping pattern turned against pulses, coarse cereals and sugarcane. It was also found that in the cropping pattern changes the expansion effect could explain 54.69% of the gross cropped area and the remaining 45.31% of the gross cropped area was due to the substitution effect.