Agricultural Universities in India

There are 63 State Agricultural Universities in India (as of Jan 2015) plus 4 Central Universities (having agriculture faculty) and 1 Central Agricultural University. All these Universities are members of the Indian Agricultural Universities Association (IAUA).

IAUA was established mainly to promote agricultural research and education in the country. It holds annual convention and also brings out a journal in order to exchange and promote ideas.

Central Universities with Agriculture Faculty are:-

• Banaras Hindu University, Varanasi, U.P.
• Aligarh Muslim University,  Aligarh, U.P.
• Vishwa Bharti, Shantiniketan, West Bengal
• Nagaland University, Medizipherma, Nagaland

Importance of Agricultural Universities for Economic Development in India

The importance of Agricultural Universities have increased tremendously in the recent past as the agricultural sector has seen a sharp decline in last couple of decade.

In spite of engaging nearly 60% of working population Indian Agricultural sector  has not been able to keep pace with the other  two sectors of the Indian economy.

The contribution of agriculture to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of the county's economy has been below 30% in the recent years thereby making it compulsory that the people involved with Agricultural Universities and other research organizations to come up with innovative ideas, new technique for dealing with the challenges that the agriculture sector is facing currently.