Punjab’s primary mode of production happens to be agriculture, even though the state is both rural and urban. This combination gives the state the ability to flourish. If one section were to struggle or change, then the whole system would be ruined. People are already leaving the rural side to go to the urban side or emigrate, which leaves villages with empty houses. People may vacate their homes, but the land will still be there, and that is the only key that is needed for the Punjabi culture to proceed in the state of Punjab for its crops and technological advancements. Punjab is the leading state in the production of crops and according to IBEF, “by 2025, it is expected that the state will be among the leading producers of non-food grains as well as exporter of various agri-products” (Brand India 2018).
The Punjab state, compared to the other states in the nation, is ahead which makes them a viable source of food in India. In the book, Incentives and Constraints in the Transformation of Punjab Agriculture, which was written in 1991, it states that, “by many conventional measures, Punjab is well advanced relative to much of the rest of India” (McGuirk and Mundlak). With this said, Punjab has been at the top and with the help of the people who live on that land, it could stay up there. If one were to visit the state of Punjab and go to any village, they would see a vast majority of land with various crops, IBEF states that. “Approximately eighty-two percent of the state’s land is under cultivation compared with the national average of forty percent” (Brand India 2018).
The surrounding states, included in the Punjabi culture, look very similar to how Punjab looks. Men work in the fields and tend to their crops, while the women stay at home to cook and clean, and the children go to school. The way the men used to bring in their crops was through oxen, where they tie a wagon behind them and go to their destination. Since times are changing, men now use a tractor and trailer, but that is if they can afford it.Along with the leading role in agriculture, according to the Agriculture Punjab, India website, ”there are 12 farmers Training centers in the state” (“agriculture information” n.d.). The Punjabi culture is prospering in this sense because they are able to keep up their agricultural role with more trained farmers.
On another level, the state is faltering. The main issue is that the people in Punjab are not preserving their groundwater, which leads to more trouble in the future for their crops. Yet, technology has advanced and according to the Water International, the technology of “the tensiometer-based application of irrigation reduces water and power consumption by 13%, cutting variable costs by 7% without any yield penalty” (Sidhu et al. 2018). There is only so much that even technology could do for people to survive in Punjab. It is also the resident’s jobs to make sure that they don’t let these resources go to waste. Crops are the primary focus in production for Punjab because that is how the people survive. Without the crops, farmers would be out of jobs, and there would be no food which would result in people starving.
Since Punjab is part of a third world country, it does not have time to delay. The state needs to improve the way they are using their groundwater and how they are tending to their crops. In the end, the only way they can keep their culture alive is to keep the citizens alive.
