International Journal of Farm Sciences 6(1) : 14-19, 2016 Regional inequalities in the agrarian development of Kerala: a multivariate approach to the causative factors KC AYYOOB and M KRISHNADAS* Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru College of Agriculture and Research Institute Karaikal 609 603 Puducherry, India *Southern Regional Station, ICAR National Dairy Research Institute Bengaluru 560030 Karnataka, India Email for correspondence: ayyoobsm@gmail.com ABSTRACT The regional inequality in agrarian development in Kerala was obtained with the help of composite index based on optimum combination of forty nine indicators by assigning weights to the indicators by the method of principal component analysis. The districts were classified into three groups based on the development and factors affecting the agricultural development across districts obtained by multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) technique. The factors namely area under paddy and high yielding varieties (HYVs), net sown area, area under total cereals, rainfall, credit flow from regional rural banks (RRBs), marine fish landing, fertilizer consumption and percentage of coastal line were significantly different across three categories of districts. Keywords: Composite index; principal component analysis; MANOVA; HYV; RRBs INTRODUCTION Agriculture occupies an important place in the economic life of Kerala people as it provides the key to economic growth and fluctuations therein; overall economic growth of the state is greatly influenced by growth achieved in agricultural sector. In Kerala only 57 per cent of the total geographical area is under cultivation with 74 per cent of total population living in rural areas. Out of the total working population 7 per cent are cultivators and 15.8 per cent are agricultural labourers in Kerala and agriculture and allied sectors contribute nearly 15 per cent to gross state domestic product (GSDP). Agriculture in the state has remained stagnant even after the implementation of several plan programmes. It was quite interesting and useful to study the factors affecting the agricultural development at district level since there has been a growing consensus about the need of micro-level planning in the country. http://www.inflibnet.ac.in/ojs/index.php/IJFS/article/view/3632/2884