Agricultural labor, COVID-19, and potential implications for food security and air quality in the breadbasket of India.

ABSTRACT: To contain the COVID-19 pandemic, India imposed a national lockdown at the end of March 2020, a decision that resulted in a massive reverse migration as many workers across economic sectors returned to their home regions. Migrants provide the foundations of the agricultural workforce in the 'breadbasket' states of Punjab and Haryana in Northwest India.There are mounting concerns that near and potentially longer-term reductions in labor availability may jeopardize agricultural production and consequently national food security. The timing of rice transplanting at the beginning of the summer monsoon season has a cascading influence on productivity of the entire rice-wheat cropping system. To assess the potential for COVID-related reductions in the agriculture workforce to disrupt production

SUBMITTER: Balwinder-Singh 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7503070 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature