Barriers Broken. Production Relations and Agrarian Change in South India Athreya, Venkatesh B.

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Barriers Broken. Production Relations and Agrarian Change in South India
Athreya, Venkatesh B.; Djurfeldt, Göran; Lindberg, Staffan
1990
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Citation for published version (APA):
Athreya, V. B., Djurfeldt, G., & Lindberg, S. (1990). Barriers Broken. Production Relations and Agrarian Change
in South India. SAGE Publications.
Total number of authors:
3
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LUND UNIVERSITY
PO Box 117
221 00 Lund
[phone]
Production Relations and Agrarian
Change in Tamil Nadu
VENKATESH B. ATHREYA
G6RAN DJURFELDT
STAFFAN LINDBERG
SAGE PUBLICATIONS
New Delhi/Newbury Park/London
Copyright© Venkatesh B. Athreya, Gora.n Djurfeldt, and Staffan Lindberg, 1990.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in t�ny forril
or by any means, electronic or mech!IJlical, including photocopying, recording or by
any information storage or retrievat §}'Stem, without permission in writing fr-om the
· .
publisher.
First published in 1990 by
Sage Publica1ions India Pvt Ltd
M-32 Greate($)r Kai•l ash Market I
New Delhi 110 048
Sage Publications· Inc Sage Publications Ltd
2111 West Hillcrest Drive 28 Banner Street
Newbury Park, California 91320 • London EC1Y SQE
Published by Tejeshwar Sing� for Sage Publications India Pvt Ltd,. phototypeset by
Mudra Typesetters, Pondicherry, and printed at Chaman Offset Printers, .Delhi.
(Us-hbk.)
ISBN 0--8039-9639-X
(India-hbk.)
81-7036-190-7
Contents
List of Iliustrations 6
List of Tables 8
Preface 11
1. Introduction 13
2. Methods 29
3. Ecology 55
4. Changing Land Relations 95
5. Labour Relations· 126
6. Identification of Agrarian passes 171
7. Usury and Credit · 234
8. Economies of Scale or Advantages of Class? 271
9. Summary and Conclusions 302
Glossary of Tamil and indian Engl�h Terms 317
References 321
Author Index 330
Subiect Index 332
.l',l
List of Illustrations.
Map 1 Location of the research area in the subcontinent 19
Map2 Kulithalei and Manaparei talukas 20
31. Rainfall and estimated evapotranspiration by
ecotype 57
3.2 Types of cultivated land by ecotype 63
3.3 Water availability (months) by type of irrigated
land and by ecotype 64
34. The use of potential land resources by ecotype 71
3.5a G:r;oss cultivated area broken down by crop and
ecotype 74
35. b Per cent rainfed area by crop (dry ecotype) 74
41. Distribution of own land 'among landowners by
ecotype 98
42. Area operateri by type of tenure and ecotype 102
4�3 Distribution of operated area by ecotype 103
4.4 Cash value of annual kuthagai payable per acre.of
leased-in irrigated land (wet area) 106
4,5 Relative distribution of owne<;i and inherited area
by ecotype 109
46. Size of own area compared with size of inherited
area by size-class of inherite.d area and ecotype 114
4.7 li> · Size of leased area compared to size of inherited
leased area broken down by size-class of inherited
leased area (for households who are or have been
·
tenants), wet area 120
48. Size of irrigated area compared to size of
inherited irrigated area broken down by size-class
of inherited irrigated area, dry area 123
5.1 Mean number of labour days hirep-out per
worker by sub-group of worker, sex and ecotype 151
5.2 Mean income by source, type of household and
ecotype l53
6
List of Illustrations • 7
5.3 Mean income per caput by type of household and
ecotype 157
6.1 The surplus criterion: distribution in main sample 198
6.2 The participation index (p): distribution in main
sample 204
6.3 Scattergram and fitted line showing the relation
between the two criteria of class for main sample
cases 205
6.4 Distance between 1st and 9th deciles of
landownership by class and ecotype 212
6.5 Class structure by ecotype 226
6.6 Relative distribution of gross area controlled
by type of tenure and class, wet area 228
6.7 Relative distribution of area operated by land
type and class, dry area 230
7.1 Purposes for which money has been borrowed
(per cent of total credit volume) 247
7.2 Mean debt and median rate of interest per
household by class and ecotype 249
7.3 Percentage of debt by purpose and class 251
7.4 Fercentage of debt from banks and credit
cooperatives by class and ecotype 252
7.5 Membership of fanners' associations by ecotype
and class 257
7.6 Purpose of private loans (per cent of credit
volume) 258
7.7 Percentage of debt from friends and relatives by
ecotype and class 260
7.8 Security of private loans (per cent of total credit
volume) 262
7.9 Mean and median interest paid on private loans
by ecotype and class 263
7.10 Debt to private lenders by occupation of lender
and ecotype 265
7
List of T abies
1.1 Caste structure by ecotype 24
2.1 Model for the selection of villages 37
2) Estimated agrarian class structure of wet and dry
villages according to pilot survey and according to
survey data (percentages of agrarian population) 43
2.3 Proportion of agricultural households in sample
villages 48
2.4 Design effect by ecotype for operated area 51
2.5 Design effects for key variables by ecotype 52
2.6 Statistics for three variables with high design
effects 53
3.1 Gross cultivated area broken down by crop and
ecotype (and for the dry ecotype: per cent of
area under crop which is rainfed) 75
3.2 Mean yields per acre by crop and ecotype 77
3.3 Total production of foodgrains per caput and per
consumption unit, by eco�ype 92
4.1 Distribution of own land among households by
ecotype 99
4.2 Proportion of rent paid to total value of farm
production by tenurial status (wet area) 107
4.3 Size of own area compared with size of inherited
area by size-class of inherited area and ecotype 116
4.4 Size of leased area compared to size of inherited
leased area bn�ken down by size-class of inherited
leased area (for households who are or have been
tenants), wet area 121
4.5 Size of irrigated area compared to size of
inherited irrigated area broken down by size-class
of inherited irrigated area, dry area 124
5.1 Percentage of households hiring-in and hiring-out
permanent farm servants, by ecotype and class 136
8
List of Tables 9
•
5.2 Mean number of labour days hired-out per
worker by sub-group of workers; sex and ecotype
(with 5 % confidence interval) 152
5.3 Mean and percentage of income by source, type
of household and ecotype 154
5.4 Mean incomes in kind by source, by type of
household and ecotype (kilogrammes of grain,
total and per caput) 161
5.5 Per cent of total labour input made by family
labour, by type of farm and ecotype 162
5.6 Per cent of total labour input made by family
labour, by crop and ecotyoe 166
6.1 Class and size of operational holdings 178
6.2 Definition of peasant classes based on their
relation to the labour market 180
6.3a Definition of peasant classes based on
reproduction· 181
6.3b Definition of peasant classes based on
reproduction 182
6.4 Subsistence rations of grain 189
6.5 Overview of symbols and variables used in
surplus criterion of class 190
6.6 Mean values for classification variables by type of
household, by source and form · 192
6.7 The participation criterion of class 200
6.8 Class as indicated by the surplus criterion cross­
tabulated by final class assigned to households in
the main sample 210
6.9 Correlations between area variables and surplus
r2)
criterion by ecotype (Pearson's r: and 214
6.10 Key for subdivision of surplus appropriators 222
6.11 Segmentation. of surplus appropriators in.lhe--wet
area for the main sample and for. the census of the
·upper percentile (UPC) · 224
6.12 Estimated class structure of wet and dry areas
(percentages of agrarian population) 227
8.1 Scale, intensity and class: means, standard
deviations and correlations with productivity by
ecotype 278
8.2 Beta-weights for the productivity regressions,
farm level 284
9
10 Barriers Broken
•
83 Yield per acre,. area under crop, labour and non­
labour inputs by crop (means and standard
deviations) 287
SA ·Productivity: results from Model (8.3] at crop
level 290
8.5 Productivity: results from Model [8.4] at crop
level 291
8.6 Class, intensity and productivity by ecotype 294
8.7 Class and input intensities, correlation
coefficients 295
10
Preface
The fieldwork for this book was carried out in1979/80 in Kulithalei
.
and Manaparei Panchayat Unions of Tiruchy District in Tamil
Nadu, In<lia. The team consisted of the authors plus Gustav Bokl.in,
agronomist, who unfortunately never got the financial and other
means to contribute to the writing of this book, but whose contri­
3,
bution, especially to the analysis made in chapter cannot be
over-emphasized.
We had a dedicated field staff without whose hard work· and
enthusiasm we would .not have managed to collect the wealth of
data we have used. The staff included R. Vidyasagar who worked
as a senior research assistant and A, Rajagopal, both of whom are
at present completing their doctorates, the former at the Madras
Institute of Development Studies and the latter at the Centre for
Developmeat Studies, Trivandrum. Other members of the staff
were S. Gurusamy and P. Boraian who have since completed the
M. Phil programme at Panjab University and at Gandhigram
Rural University respectively. Other members of the staff were:
S.T. Arasu, K.P. Ayyavoo, A. Chellaiyah, G. Jothi, V.V. Krishna­
moorthy, S. Mariasusai, K.S. Natarajan, V.R.J. Prabalen,
K.
S. Sampath, and Mrs. R. Brindhuvahini. Dr. Gopal Iyer of
Panj ab University also participatedin parts of the fieldwork as did
Mr. V. Bhaskar, then of Jawaharlal Nehru University. To all of
them our warmest thanks!
The project was affiliated to the Madras Institute of Develop­
ment Studies., and we are grateful to its Director, Professor C. T.
Kurien and his faculty, for intellectual and other support. Financial
support was extended by the Copenhagen and Lund universities,
by the Scandinavian Institute of Asian Studies, and by the Swedish
Agency for Research Cooperation with Developing Countries
(SAREC). SAREC funded the fieldwork in 1979/80 and also a
part of the costs of data analysis. We are grateful to Dr Carl­
Gustaf Thornstrom at SAREC for his supvort of the project.
11