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Common Property Resources and the Agrarian Economy

Researchers: Ajit Menon and Ananda G. Vadivelu

This short study examined the role of common property resources (CPRs) within different agrarian landscapes across a multitude of agro-climatic zones in India. The analysis was based primarily on data from the 54th round of the National Sample Survey (NSS) on de jure and de facto CPRs, supplemented by existing case study literature on the commons. The main purpose was to re-examine the underlying assumption that the rural poor depend more on CPRs than the non-poor and that CPRs are more important in semi-arid and forest zones than in the intensive agricultural belts.

We found that CPRs do indeed benefit the rural poor the most, and especially the landless, across most agro-climatic zones including agriculture intensive pockets of the country. A more disaggregated analysis of the data illustrated that while CPRs continue to be important, they have declined in extent over time and become tenurially more insecure in terms of community access. The study also highlighted that while the poor (and the landless) are more dependent on certain CPR products such as fuelwood this is not the case in terms of fodder where the landed are more dependent. This is especially noticeable in Green Revolution areas such as Punjab and Haryana. Here too, however, the poor and the landed depend more on the commons while the landed on private lands. The study concludes by suggesting that secondary data sets such as the 54th round need to pay more attention to use of and access to different types of CPRs.

Presented at: All-India Conference on Agriculture and Rural Society in Contemporary India, Bardhaman, 17-20 December 2003.

Contact: cised@isec.ac.in

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