Calcutta Geographical Review December 1945

The diversity of climate has brought the rice and the wheat cultures at the cross-roads of the Province and has compelled those who are concerned to tackle at the one end with the threatening of the encroachment of the Thar and on the other with the problem of water-logging and over-saturation of soil. [...] The survey of food-resources is to be made from the point of view of production or the means of subsistence and of the considerations of the main factors affecting the exploitation of food resources to realise the extent to which greater output in this direction is possible. [...] If in England the imports of food-stuffs determine the quantity available for home consumption in the United Provinces it is the quantity of food-stuffs exported that determines the quantity available for the use of the inhabitants. [...] The increase in the area under grain and peas is obviously due to the development of the system of double-cropping ; while the increase in the area under barley has been due to the fact that wheat cannot be grown wider favourable conditions in this region and barley serves as the foograin of the masses. [...] The devlopment of the practice of double cropping as a result.of the increasing pressure of population on land has led to an increase in the area under the cheaper varieties of rabi grains and it is due to the importance of the leguminous food grains of the rabi harvest that a well balanced diet in these densely populated rice-regions has evolved.