CHANGES IN LEVELS OF MAIZE PRODUCTIVITY IN HIMACHAL PRADESH:1990-91 TO 2014-15

The chief objective of the present study is to revealspatial patterns of maize productivity and Changes in HimachalPradesh during 1990-91 to 2014-15. For achieving this purpose,the study is divided into three parts. First part deals with spatialpatterns of maize productivity. It is found that the index value ofmaize productivity varied from minimum of 47.55 percent in Spititehsil to 155.90 percent in Churah tehsil in 1990-91. While in2002-03, it varied from 47.45 percent in Lahaul tehsil to 143.14percent in Churah tehsil. Whereas in 2014-15, it is lowest of 47.97percent in Spiti tehsil and highest of 141.51 percent in Churahtehsil. It is also observed that in all time periods, magnitude ofmaize productivity starts declining from west to east. In secondpart, it is found that in Himachal Pradesh, the highest index valueof maize productivity has declined from 150.90 percent to 141.15percent during 1990-91 to 2014-15 and registered overallnegative change of 8.39 percent index value. Whereas the lowestindex value of maize productivity has increased from 47.55percent in 1990-91 to 47.97 percent in 2014-15 and experience0.42 percent increase in lowest index value of maize productivityduring study period, thus the gap between high and lowmagnitude of maize productivity has minimized which shows thatsign of healthy maize cultivation. In third part, major problems areidentified and suggestions are made to solve these problems forincreasing the maize productivity in the state. The present studyis empirical in nature and based on secondary sources of data.Three time periods are taken and averages are derived for eachtime period, because 1990-91 is the year of liberalization era and2002-03 and 2014-15 are post liberalization period. Singh (1976),technique is used for deriving the results and choropleth methodis applied for mapping the results.