Analysis of Agricultural Development in Odisha: A Statistical Study

Odisha is agriculture-based state, where most of the people depend on agriculture for their living and source of income. So the status of agricultural development of different districts of the state Odisha has been estimated with the help of composite index based on optimum combination of twenty one developmental indicators. Out of those twenty-one indicators, eighteen are crops and remaining three like Gross Cropped Area, fertilizer consumption and irrigated area are taken on the basis of their impact on the agriculture in the districts of Odisha. The secondary data regarding the yield of important crops, gross cropped area, fertilizer and irrigated area are used as indicator variables All the thirty districts have been included in the study. Bargarh district is found to be the best developed district in the farm sector whereas Boudh is on the last position. On the basis of result obtained from the correlation coefficient of the yield rate it is concluded that the yield rate of cereals has positive correlation with the production of oilseeds. Agricultural development is found to be highly associated with the productivity levels of cereals and pulses. Wide disparities have been observed in the level of development of different districts. Four districts namely Gajapati, Kandhamal, Sonepur and Boudh are found to be much below to the level of average performance of Odisha state in almost all the developmental indicators. General suggestions for improving the level of agricultural development of low developed districts have been given.