The Harappan villages, mostly situated near the flood plains, produced sufficient foodgrains not only to feed themselves but also to town people.
The Indus people sowed seeds in the flood plains in November, when the flood water receded, and reaped their harvests of wheat and barley in April, before the advent of the next flood.
No hoe or ploughshare has been discovered, but the furrows discovered in the pre-Harappan phase at Kalibangan show that the fields were ploughed in Rajasthan. The Harappan probably used the wooden ploughshare.
The chief crops were wheat, barley, rai, peas, sesamum, mustard, etc. Probably the people of Lothal used rice as early as 1800 BC. The Indus people were the earliest people to produce cotton.
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Because cotton was first produced in the Indus region, the Greeks called it sindon, which is derived from Sindh. Wheat samples from the Indus cities have been identified as belonging to Triticum sphaerococcum and two subspecies of Triticum Sativum- vulgare and compactum.
Barley is also found, of the species Hordeum vulgare, variety nudum and variety hexastichum. Other Harappan crops include dates, melon, sesame, and varieties of leguminous plants, such as field peas. From Chanhu-daro, seeds of mustard (most probably Brassica juncea) were obtained.
A number of domesticated animal species have been found in excavations at the Harappan sites. The Indian humped cattle (Ros indicus) were most frequently encountered. The buffalo is less common and may have been wild.
Sheep and goats occur, as does the Indian pig. Elephant was present, but not necessarily as a domesticated species. The horse was possibly present but extremely rare and apparently only present in the last stages of the Harappan period.