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National Dairy Development Board
Part VII :
Agriculture
Karnataka has long coastline, perennial rivers and varying agro-climatic zones. The climate endowment
supports cultivation of cash crops like coffee, coconut, mango, spices, commercial flowers, aromatic
plants, cotton, sugarcane, oilseeds, grapes, pomegranate, sapota, etc and helps/assists 65 per cent of
the population of Karnataka to engage in farming activities.
However, the share of agriculture in the state GDP is around 15 per cent and performance of the sector is
volatile due to a significant area being under arid zone. In order to accelerate growth of agriculture and
allied sector, the government of Karnataka has put in place an ‘Integrated Agribusiness Development
Policy - 2011’linking productionwithmarket. Since 2011-12, Karnataka is the first state having a separate
agriculture budget. In 2013, the government also envisaged an ‘Agricultural Prices Commission’ to
fix suitable prices for commodities. During mid-2014, the State Level Bankers Committee (SLBC) was
directed to enhance credit flow to farmers willing to invest in high technology for agriculture. The
University of Agricultural Sciences (UAS, Bangalore) was bifurcated into two agricultural universities
to facilitate localised research as per agro-climates zones. Thus, all efforts are being made towards
sustainable agriculture in Karnataka.