Global research paradigms in chickpea economics: An approach with Indian scenario

Abstract

Economics of pulse production is still in its infancy, even though literature on the subject has grown in tandem with the volume of business and attention received by the export-import culture, consumed and traded amount. With a distinct shift in the trend of chickpea production within India and obtained high yield productivity, new constraints have cropped up in the productivity sector of chickpea. In spite of these constraints, innovations in chickpea production have come up; for example, low input livelihood pulse based agriculture systems, sustainable and ecological agriculture, etc. in many parts of the world. These have a definite bearing on the long-run payoffs from small-scale agriculture. Moreover, Chickpea production in tropical countries has been found to be economically viable as a farm diversification strategy and as an independent commercial activity, turning our attention on bio-economic modelling. Cross-price effects of chickpea based agriculture products, effects of trade and non-trade barriers on these products, potential conflicts between the development of chickpea production for export and agriculture for subsistence consumption are the other serious concerns that need to be addressed. With the ever-increasing demand for varietal items based on chickpea in the international market, more research on demand-elasticities and its analysis would be appropriate, especially in the Indian context for the evaluation of the current status and prediction of future scenario of chickpea production. Evaluation of the prevalent chickpea based agriculture technologies can be strengthened by specific farm technical-efficiency studies, which is another area that demands attention in the chickpea economics research. To address such leads and lags, global pulse economists in the country need to take up these challenges by having real time field exposure to different segments of chickpea production.