Hill agriculture has its unique characteristics and the growth potential of hill agriculture has remained under-exploited due to various mountain specifics like undulating topography, lack of system-specific technologies, poor marketing, and processing infrastructure, and underdeveloped supporting institutions.
Mountains play a crucial role in sustaining about 10 percent of the world population directly. In addition, mountains sustain the life of people living in the plains as they are the major source of water supply as a majority of rivers originate from these ecosystems. The major mountain ranges in India are the Himalayas and the Western Ghats. They traverse an arc of about 2500km between the Indus and the Brahmaputra rivers. In India,
The mountain ecosystem is spread over 12 states in India: Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Uttranchal, Sikkim, Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Tripura, and West Bengal. Thye is inhabited by 51 million people, covering 18 percent of the geographical area and 6 percent of India's population. The rich environmental heritage of the Himalayan regions under pressure from natural and human-induced
Stress. It has potential for quality seed production and commercial floriculture.
Even though we have several constraints in hill agriculture, we have opportunities to harness the productive potential of surface water and agro-climatic diversities that favor the cultivation of fruits, vegetables, and crops of industrial importance.