Background: India became self-sufficient in food because of the Green Revolution in the 1960s. However, both the technological innovation and policy support have been biased toward cereals. It is expected that cereals are the major source of proteins in the diet. In recent years, the consumption of cereals is declining in spite of increasing output due to declining preference. Therefore, the country needs to increase production and consumption of pulses to meet the nutritional requirements of the population. Objectives: This article discusses the trends in pulse and protein consumption over the years. Further, it focuses on the substitutability and complementarity between various sources of proteins. Methods: A seemingly unrelated regression estimation (SURE) framework is used to study the price and income effect on proteins from different sources-cereals and pulses (plant sources), milk and milk products, animal sources such as eggs, fish, and meat, and other sources of protein. Results: It is found that the expenditure on proteins is large and significant. As income increases, consumption of proteins increases. Higher disposable incomes have led to higher demand of animal sources of proteins. There are significant food price effects in our analysis-negative for cereals and positive for eggs. As the price of pulses increases, consumption of animal sources of proteins increases. Conclusion: It becomes important to contain volatility in pulse prices given that it is a major source of plant protein. States distributing pulses in the Public Distribution System show higher consumption of proteins than other states.

The paper reviews the evidence of agriculture-nutrition linkages with particular reference to South Asia from studies published during the period 2012-2018. South Asia houses the largest population of undernourished people in the world and a majority of the population in the region is dependent on agriculture and allied activities and live in rural areas. Following a review of agriculture nutrition linkage, the paper reviews recent work in South Asia focusing on the pathway of agriculture as an asset and source of food and the role of women in agriculture. The evidence from reviews of agriculture nutrition linkage finds lack of robust evidence of impact on nutrition outcomes. The studies from South Asia highlight the importance of production diversity, agriculture and land productivity and enabling factors of WASH and women's empowerment, for impact on dietary diversity and nutrition outcomes. This points to need for policy focus in these areas. Most of the studies were based on secondary data and the search yielded very few intervention-based studies; there were also no studies from Pakistan. The importance of leveraging agriculture for nutrition in order to progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) is now well accepted. Along with efforts to improve dietary diversity through agriculture, long-term intervention studies with robust design targeting nutrition indicators can help better inform policy.

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