The global economy has faced two serious but unconnected crises in quick succession during the past four years. The years 2007 and 2008 witnessed an unprecedented rise in food prices which forced the global community to pay more attention to the agricultural sector.

Agriculture is the core sector of Indian economy. The share of agriculture and allied sectors in total GDP presently is about 16 percent and it engages nearly 52 per cent of the national workforce. Agriculture therefore continues to remain the principal source of livelihood for the majority of households in India.

The early nineties saw a substantial overhauling of the Indian economy through Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP), which encompassed a number of measures, viz., liberalisation of export-import policy, drastic lowering of import duties on many products, removal of import restrictions, reduction of investment in the agricultural and industrial sectors so as to allow the private sector to take

Agricultural price policy has come under serious attack recently for recommending support prices higher than what the costs of production warrant, supposedly leading to a distortion of the market, and, therefore, to food deprivation.

Spatial location of the farm households shapes farming practices and livelihoods of the farmers. Many socio-economic variables have strong spatial relations that would otherwise be missed by data aggregation at household level. Geographic Information System (GIS) provides display and analysis of socio-economic data that may be fundamental for many social scientists to understand socio-economic reality influenced by geographical position of the farm households.