Changing Patterns in the Paddy Cultivation in Sri Lanka

Abstract

Sri Lanka is a predominantly an agrarian country, with paddy as the main crop cultivated. Paddy is a crop that is heavily depended on rainfall. Any excess or deficit of rainfall can completely destroy the paddy harvest. From the ancient times Sri Lanka is famous for the high paddy production and the recent governments of Sri Lanka always took measures to improve the paddy production in the country, to meet the needs of the growing population (Yoshino et al., 1984). According to Prof Thambyahpillay, “agriculture in the Indian areas is a gamble in the monsoon”; time and again, the monsoon has „failed‟ either to appear on time or to produce the rainfall amount that is expected of it. It has been tradition to assign specific dates for the onset and withdrawal of the rains, and the early or the late onset as well as early or late departures of rains would ruin the crops. Paddy is cultivated by irrigation and rain; in the western and southwestern part of the island paddy is cultivated by rain, and in the Dry zone paddy is cultivated by irrigation. The rain based agriculture in the western and southwestern parts of the country is heavily dependent on the South West Monsoon rains (Kankanam et al., 2007). According to statistics, approximately 800,000 farmers and their families depend directly on paddy, which is grown on 30% of total land area. The total area paddy, cultivated in the two agricultural seasons of Yala (March-September) and Maha (October- February), exceeded 852,000 ha in 2002. The major part of the rice produced (70%) is derived from small paddy holdings below 1.0 ha in extent. As many as 314,000 farmers are tenant cultivators; nearly these tenants grow paddy on holdings less than 0.4ha in extent. Unfortunately third of the countries land area in the dry and intermediate zone; this is where paddy is highly concentrated. Collectively these two zones account for 72% of the total paddy production in the country (De Silva, C. S. et al., 2004) The Wet zone includes three quarter of the cultivable land most of the potentially productive land is in the Dry zone. The Governments pursue policy developments in the Dry zone and has promoted several development schemes. The diversion of the waters of the Mahaweli river to irrigate the Dry zone is the far the most ambitious project undertaken to redevelop the Dry zone. This project encompasses nearly 40 % 55 of the total land area in the country. One of the basic aims of the project is to maximization of agricultural production which has become a necessity on account of the growing population in the country and the strain on foreign exchange (Mendis, M.W.J.G, 1973). The Dry zone of Sri Lanka is considered the granary of the nation, paddy produced in this region is of utmost important as it supplies the food demand of the growing population. After the Independence the Mahaweli Project was introduced in 1977 to cultivate paddy in the Dry zone. Changing rainfall pattern in Sri Lanka have prompted later paddy planting by farmers and affected the country‟s overall rice yield. Significant amount of the rainfall to the upper watershed area of the Mahaweli has been reduced during past hundred years by 39.12 % and the rainfall pattern is in declining trend (Shantha, W. W. A et al., 2004).