Spatio-Temporal Distribution of Agro-Service Centres in the Koch Bihar District of North Bengal, India

Abstract

Agro-service centres are an important instrument for the development of agriculture. Higher agricultural production is not possible without agro-services. The study has chosen four types of centres, namely agro-input centres, cold storage, Samabay Krishi Unnayan Samity and Krishi Vigyan Kendra. The study has selected Koch Bihar District, which is located in the north-eastern part of North Bengal, and it is covered by the riverine plain area. The study aims to study the pattern of spatial-temporal distribution of agro-service centres. The study has used primary data through structured interviews and point data using GPS location. The study has applied different suitable techniques, such as the standard distance, mean centres, median centre, standard deviation ellipse, nearest neighbour analysis, location quotient and kernel density. Besides, the study has used a thematic map in GIS environments. The study found that the district has recorded the highest in retail centres, followed by wholesale input service centres, SKUS, cold storage and KVK. Cooch Behar-I block has recorded the highest wholesale input centres. Besides, Cooch Behar-II has recorded the highest number of cold storages, and KVK is located in this block. Most of the input service centres are developed in post-liberalization period of the district. Out of 90.48%, cold storages are developed post-liberization period, whereas SKUS are developed pre-liberization period. Cold storage has recorded highest positive change, and SKUS has recorded highest negative change between the pre-liberization and post-liberization period. The distribution of Agro-service centres has a cluster pattern (Rn value 0.21) means that centres are located close to each other. The middle part of the district has the highest kernel density value, which means higher clustering. The government should initiate new Agro-service centres for agro-service in the marginal part of the district, where farmers easily access the services.