Two-thirds of India’s population is engaged in agricultural activities. It is a primary activity, which produces food grains and raw materials for industries.
India is geographically a vast country so it has various food and non-food crops which are cultivated in three main cropping seasons which are rabi, kharif and zaid.
Major crops can be classified into-
- Food crops- Rice, Wheat, Millets, Maize and Pulses.
- Cash crops- Sugarcane, Oilseeds, Horticulture crops, Tea, Coffee, Rubber, Cotton and Jute.
Cropping Seasons
| Cropping Season | Time Period | Crops | States |
| Rabi | Sown: October-December Harvested: April-June |
Wheat, barley, peas, gram, mustard etc. | Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh |
| Kharif | Sown: June-July Harvested: September-October |
Rice, maize, jowar, bajra, tur, moong, urad, cotton, jute, groundnut, soybean etc. | Assam, West Bengal, coastal regions of Odisha, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Maharashtra |
| Zaid | Sown and harvested: March-July (between Rabi and Kharif) |
Seasonal fruits, vegetables, fodder crops etc. | Most of the northern and northwestern states |
