Growth and instability of cotton production in India

India has attained the status of world’s largest cotton producer (29.50 million bales of 480 lb)which-happens to be 24.31per cent of the world’s total production surpassing the China (27.75million bales-of 480 lb) in 2020.The yield in India is less than that of even smaller cotton producing countries such-as Australia, Egypt etc. Cotton is cultivated on about 12.30 million hectares of land in the country with the production of 32.80 million bales. The present study was undertaken to examine the trends, growth and instability in cotton production in India and to analyze sources of growth of cotton production in the country. The findings showed that India registered a negative growth of area of cotton at -0.21 percent which was non-significant during 1995-96 to 2003-04 (Period I). The Compound Annual Growth Rate (CAGR) of area increased significantly to 3.61 per cent during 2004-05 to 2017-18 (Period II) mainly due to introduction of BT cotton. The performance of production was not impressive in period I as it declined significantly at rate of -3.05 percent which might be due to decrease in area and yield during the said period. The productivity of cotton showed a positive growth in period II and overall period at the rates of 3.32 percent and 4.94 percent respectively. It was revealed that the significant growth in area, production-and productivity of cotton in period II and overall period due to rapid spread of Bt cotton. Instability in-area was less in period I as compared to period II whereas variability for yield was observed more in period I (12.81%) than that in period II (9.41%) . The decomposition of cotton production in area, yield and interaction effect showed that the yield effect was responsible for increasing the production of cotton-in India during period II.