BharatNotes What is Shifting Cultivation (Jhum)?
Shifting cultivation is a subsistence farming system in which a forest patch is cleared, the slashed vegetation is dried and burned in situ (the ash enriches the soil), and the plot is cropped for a few seasons until yields fall. The land is then abandoned to natural regeneration (fallow) while the cultivator shifts to a new patch. In North-East India it is locally called jhum or jhumming. Globally it is known as slash-and-burn, swidden, or land-rotation agriculture.
It is practised largely on hill slopes by tribal communities and relies on rainfall, simple tools (the digging stick/hoe) and family labour rather than ploughs, irrigation or chemical inputs.
Regional Names in India
| Region / State | Local name |
|---|---|
| North-Eastern hill states | Jhum / Jhumming |
| Madhya Pradesh / Chhattisgarh | Bewar, Dahiya, Penda |
| Andhra Pradesh | Podu, Penda |
| Odisha | Pama Dabi, Koman, Bringa |
| Western Ghats (Kerala, Karnataka) | Kumari |
| South-eastern Rajasthan | Valre / Waltre |
| Manipur | Pamlou |
Jhum remains a dominant mode of food production and economic mainstay across the uplands of Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland and Tripura.
The Jhum Cycle and Its Crisis
The "jhum cycle" is the interval between successive cultivations of the same plot. Traditionally this fallow stretched 10–20 years, giving the forest time to regenerate and restore soil fertility — a genuinely sustainable rotation. Owing to population growth and land pressure, the cycle has now shrunk to roughly 3–5 years (and as little as 2–3 years in places), well below the minimum fallow needed for ecological recovery.
This shortening converts a once-balanced practice into a driver of degradation: accelerated soil erosion on slopes, declining productivity, loss of forest vegetation, and frequent forest fires. The India State of Forest Report (ISFR) 2023 notes that shortened jhum cycles mean large forest areas are slashed and burned annually, raising fire risk across biodiversity-rich North-Eastern forests, and lists shifting cultivation among the causes of forest-cover fluctuation in the region.
Policy Status
The NITI Aayog report "Mission on Shifting Cultivation: Towards a Transformational Approach" (2018) flagged the lack of authentic, updated data on jhum area and households, and the policy incongruence between forest, agriculture and environment departments. Its key recommendation was to recognise jhum land as "agricultural land" under agro-forestry rather than forestland, and to treat jhum fallows as "regenerating fallows" capable of becoming secondary forest. Estimates cited in policy discussion put North-East jhum area at around 8,500 sq km (NITI Aayog, 2018), though figures vary across sources owing to data gaps.
UPSC Angle
For Prelims, master the name-to-region matching and the burn-crop-fallow sequence. For Mains (GS1 agriculture/GS3 environment), frame jhum as a culturally embedded tribal practice that is sustainable only with long fallows — arguing for reform (alder-based jhum, settled terraces, agro-forestry, secure land tenure) rather than outright bans.
