Minsum goal programming approach for optimal farming in Burdwan district

This paper presents the potential use of goal programming (GP) approach for modeling and solving agricultural planning problems for optimal production of various seasonal crops cultivated in a plan period. In the proposed approach, the target levels for utilization of total cultivable land, achievement of production levels of different seasonal crops, budget allocation, and the overall profit achievement throughout the planning year, are described as their aspiration levels. In the model formulation, the objective goals with the fixed target levels are converted into the standard form of goals in GP approach by introducing under-and over-deviational variables to each of them. In the goal achievement function, minsum GP is addressed to minimize the sum of weighted under-and over-deviational variables for achieving satisfactory level financial profit in the decision making context.

The agricultural planning of Burdwan district, West Bengal, India is considered as a real-case example to illustrate the proposed approach. The model solution is compared with the district existing cropping structure to establish the efficiency of the approach.