Evaluation of Agricultural Productivity using Remote Sensing and GIS in Dindigul Panchayat Union, Dindigul District, Tamil Nadu

Agriculture is still the main source of income for India including Tamil Nadu. There is an alarming need to increase food production to meet the need of increasing population. In order to fulfill this, the agricultural productivity of our land resources should be maintained to achieve the optimum utilization of land. The term “Agricultural Productivity” can be defined as a measure of efficiency in an agricultural production system which employs land, labour, capital and other related resources. For this, an attempt is made to evaluate the agricultural productivity of Dindigul panchayat union for the years 1973, 1997 and 2017. Metropolitan Landscape Planning Model (METLAND Model) aims at identifying the levels of agricultural productivity since it evaluates a direct relationship between soil, land use and agricultural productivity. This model analyses the interaction between the Soil Suitability and Land use Detractor Groupings. According to the suitability for traditional crops, soil suitability map is prepared and land use maps are derived from the appropriate satellite images. By aggregating the soil suitability and Land use detractor groups, the agricultural productivity is evaluated for the study area. This analysis would help the planning authorities for future development.