Crop Diversification: Pattern, Determinants and its Impact on Nutritional Security in India

Abstract

Crop diversification is important in the nutritional point of view. Better income prospects and higher marketable surplus can supplement the consumption of nutritious food in terms of variety as well as quantity. Earlier literature suggests the direct effect of crop diversification on food availability and nutrition. In India, diversifying towards coarse cereals improves nutritional supply, climate resilience and resource use efficiency and reduce greenhouse gas emissions without compromising calorie production. Diverse production systems focusing on horticultural crops add to food security and reduce anemia. Consumption of a well-balanced and diversified diet is a sustainable strategy to check problems associated with malnutrition. With this background, this study examined the status of crop diversification in India and its determinants, and impact of crop diversification on the district wise nutritional status in India. We used the Simpson Index of diversification (Sd) as an indicator of crop diversification. We found that the area share of food crops is declining in the central, western, and southern regions while the area share is increasing in the northern and eastern regions. The area share of cereals and millets is declining in all regions except northern region and eastern region for the past decade and a half. The area share of pulse crops is increasing in the western and southern regions. The share of high-value crops such as fruits and vegetables has also increased in all the regions during the study period. We estimated the extent of crop diversification at the regional/state level for food crops, non-food crops and the whole crop sector. Also, we analyzed the relationship between crop diversification and nutritional status at the district level using simulation study employing bivariate copula function. We used indicators of child and adult nutrition status and compared the relative performance of districts in their nutritional outcomes using the undernutrition index as a proxy. Using hierarchical clustering, we grouped states and districts based on the index values. Results of the simulation study using bivariate copula function indicated a dominant influence of crop diversification on reducing undernutrition in India. Overall, the varying extent of crop diversification across regions implies that region specific interventions are necessary to promote the crop diversification