Agriculture

About 70% of the people live in the villages and 71% of the total work force is engaged in agriculture. The main crops are rice, ragi, jowar, maize, and pulses besides oilseeds and number of cash crops. Coffee is the principal plantation crop. Cashew, coconut, arecanut, cardamom, chilies, cotton, sugarcane and tobacco are among the other crops. Karnataka also has considerable horticultural production and the potential is higher.

Industry

Karnataka has become one of the leading states in the field of industrial development both in the private and public sectors and in the area of computer software, which has attracted national and international firms to the city of Bangalore. The state capital was long ago chosen by the central government for the location of a number of industries like Bharat Electronics Ltd, Bharat Earth movers, Hindustan Machine Tools-HMT, Bharat Heavy Electricals- BHEL etc.

Bangalore has become one of the major centre of electronic industry apart from computer software.

The state has a number of traditional cottage and small industries like handlooms, silk weaving etc. Karnataka being the leading state for silk rearing and production of Khadi and village industries. Apart from the numerous factories in engineering, chemicals, electrical, and electronic goods, there are food processing and processing of plantation products like tea, coffee, rubber, cashew etc.