Author(s): B. TRIPURA and S. MONDAL

Abstract: Shifting cultivation is an agricultural system in which a person uses a piece of land, only to abandon or alter the initial use a short time later. Shifting cultivation, which is still prevalent in the uplands of north eastern, India. The popular prejudices against shifting cultivation are conflated with other negative attributes ascribed to indigenous peoples throughout the region: that they are backward, primitive, a hindrance to national progress, disloyal to and a security problem for the state etc. The department of forest, Govt. of Tripura, found that 27,278 families (1, 36000 persons) were dependent on Jhum cultivation (2007). A study was conducted on 60 Jhumia families randomly selected from two villages under the Dhumbur Nagar R.D block of Dhalai district, Tripura. To find out the socio-economic and agronomical constraints of Jhumias in shifting cultivation in Tripura, 16 independent and one dependent variable were selected for the study. Data were collected by personal interview method in the month of October and November 2014. For analysis of the data, ranking and coefficient of correlation was followed. It was found that lack of availability of land was first rank followed by lack of soil fertility, distant location of land, lack of adequate credit were in highest rank, followed by very limited govt. subsidy on production inputs, lack of efficient marketing facility at village level, lack of knowledge on balanced fertilizer application, lack of knowledge of IPM/INM, low profit from sale of vegetable crop and lack of adequate remunerative price for output were found be associated with shifting cultivation and socio-economic and agronomical constraints such as family size, number of family member involved, land size, selection of crop, methods of sowing and timely harvest were found to be negatively significant with shifting cultivation.

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