Green Revolution in India: What's Reality And How Real

In India the World Bank joined forces with the U.S. Agency for International Development starting in the 1960s to promote the "green revolution" and import fertilizer, seeds, pesticides and farm machinery.

In 1969, the Terai Seed Corporation was started with a US$13 million World Bank loan. This was followed by two National Seeds Project (NSP) loans.

This program led to the homogenization and corporatization of India's agricultural system. The Bank provided NSP with US$41 million between 1974 and 1978. The projects were intended to develop state institutions and to create a new infrastructure for increasing the production of green revolution seed varieties.

In 1988, the World Bank gave India's seed sector a fourth loan to make it more "market responsive." The US$150 million loan aimed to privatize the seed industry and open India to multinational seed corporations.

Yet a study by the World Resources Institute, published in 1994, showed that the Green Revolution only increased Indian food production by 5.4% while the environmental degradation it has caused has raised serious worries.

Thus although the cultivated area increased by seven percent because of double cropping on irrigated farms, some 8.5 million hectares or six percent of the crop base was lost to waterlogging, salinity or excess alkalinity.

Although the amount of wheat doubled over the period of 20 years, rice production went up 50% and production of commercial crops like sugarcane and cotton went up, this increase in cultivation of these crops came at the expense of crops like chickpeas and millet, crops grown by the poor for themselves.