Potato growing zones in India

• North India Hills: This zone covers hills of Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir, Uttar Pradesh, Meghalaya, Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, Manipur, Mizoram and Tripura. This zone is further subdivided into two zones.
• North western and Central Himalayas: this zone covers the hills of Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir and Uttar Pradesh.
• North Eastern Hills: This zone comprises hills of Meghalaya, Manipur, Tripura, Nagaland, Arunachal Pradesh and Mizoram.
  
• North Indian Plains: More than 80% of potato is cultivated in this zone. The crop is grown under short day conditions and suffers from mid day water stress. This zone is further divided into three sub-zones.
• North Western Plains: It covers Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan and parts of neighboring states.
• North central Plains: It consists of western Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh.
• North Eastern Plains: This zone consists of plains of Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, West Bengal, Assam and Orissa.
• Special Problem areas: The special problem areas are faced with specific problems of potato cultivation not known in other parts of the country. These areas are:
• Sikkim and North Bengal Hills: The area comprises of Sikkim and Darjeeling Hills of West Bengal. Wart caused by Synchytrium endobioticum is a special problem in this area.
• Plateau region: It covers vast areas of central and peninsular India. This zone consists of parts of Gujarat, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka and Orissa. Red sandy or fine textured block cotton soils characterize this area. Black soils develop cracks on drying which exposr the tubers to potato tuber moth (PTM) and greening in sunlight.
• South Indian Hills: This zone comprise of the Southern hill zone in Tamil Nadu. Infestation by cyst nematodes (Globodera rostochiensis and G. pallida) is a special problem of the area.

The potato crop thrives up to snow line. The hill areas because of almost virus free environment offer good scope for seed potato industry. Himachal Pradesh, U.P, hills and Sikkim provide the bulk of the Hill seed potato for the plains of India. More than 80% potato in India is grown in sub-tropical during winter which differs than those prevalent in potato season of temperate countries.