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Dr. Rajendra Prasad Central Agricultural University, Pusa

In the imperial Gazetteer of India 1878, Pusa was recorded as a government estate of about 1350 acres in Darbhanba. It was acquired by East India Company for running a stud farm to supply better breed of horses mainly for the army. Frequent incidence of glanders disease (swelling of glands), mostly affecting the valuable imported bloodstock made the civil veterinary department to shift the entire stock out of Pusa. A British tobacco concern Beg Sutherland & co. got the estate on lease but it also left in 1897 abandoning the government estate of Pusa. Lord Mayo, The Viceroy and Governor General, had been repeatedly trying to get through his proposal for setting up a directorate general of Agriculture that would take care of the soil and its productivity, formulate newer techniques of cultivation, improve the quality of seeds and livestock and also arrange for imparting agricultural education. The government of India had invited a British expert. Dr. J. A. Voelcker who had submitted as report on the development of Indian agriculture. As a follow-up action, three experts in different fields were appointed for the first time during 1885 to 1895 namely, agricultural chemist (Dr. J. W. Leafer), cryptogamic botanist (Dr. R. A. Butler) and entomologist (Dr. H. Maxwell Lefroy) with headquarters at Dehradun (U.P.) in the forest Research Institute complex. Surprisingly, until now Pusa, which was destined to become the centre of agricultural revolution in the country, was lying as before an abandoned government estate. In 1898. Lord Curzon took over as the viceroy. A widely traveled person and an administrator, he salvaged out the earlier proposal and got London’s approval for the appointment of the inspector General of Agriculture to which the first incumbent Mr. J. Mollison (Dy. Director of Agriculture, Bombay) joined in 1901 with headquarters at Nagpur The then government of Bengal had mooted in 1902 a proposal to the centre for setting up a model cattle farm for improving the dilapidated condition of the livestock at Pusa estate where plenty of land, water and feed would be available, and with Mr. Mollison’s support this was accepted in principle. Around Pusa, there were many British planters and also an indigo research centre Dalsing Sarai (near Pusa). Mr. Mollison’s visits to this mini British kingdom and his strong recommendations. In favour of Pusa as the most ideal place for the Bengal government project obviously caught the attention for the viceroy.

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Subject: Agricultural Economics × Author: K T, THILAK × End date: 2021 × Start date: 2021 × Type: Thesis ×
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    ThesisItemOpen Access
    AN ECONOMIC ANALYSIS OF COCONUT PRODUCTION IN HASSAN DISTRICT OF KARNATAKA
    (Dr.RPCAU, Pusa, 2021) K T, THILAK; Sinha, D. K.
    The present study aims at assessing the trends in area, production, productivity and exports from India, costs and returns involved in production of coconut, resource use efficiency of inputs, constraints in production and marketing of coconut in Hassan district of Karnataka. The primary data was obtained from 120 farmers from 10 randomly selected villages of Hassan district of Karnataka by using survey method. The area of coconut had increased from 1893 thousand hectares in 2001-02 to 2109 thousand hectares in 2019-20 with a small compound annual growth rate of 0.6 %. The production of coconut rose from 12822 thousand metric tonnes in 2001-02 to 19717 thousand metric tonnes in 2019-20 with a considerable compound annual growth rate of 2.4. on the other hand, the export of coconut and its by-products showed growth from 25.56 crores in 2001-02 to 2006.73 crores in 2019-20 with a solid compound annual growth rate of 33.9 %. On overall farms level, the inputs requirement for establishment of coconut orchard like, hired labour, family labour, machine labour, seedlings, manure and fertilizer were found to be 49.09 man days, 45.40 man days, 98.63 machine hours, 133.36 seedlings, 407.21 quintals and 741.31 kgs, respectively. On overall level, the total cost of establishment or (Cost-C2) of coconut orchard was estimated to be Rs.529259.79. On overall farms level, for maintenance, inputs requirements like, hired labour, family labour, machine labour, soil bedding, manure and fertilizer was assumed to be 19.18 man days, 13.25 man days, 14.50 machine hours, 97.04 loads, 96.97 quintals and 247.41 kgs respectively. On overall farms level, the total cost of maintenance or (Cost-C2) of coconut orchard was found to be Rs.168891.34. At overall farms level, gross return from coconut was found to be Rs.3,26,999.9. The main contributor to gross returns was main product with Rs.310763.7. Further, the incomes from husk, broom and leaf base were estimated to be Rs.14125.6, Rs.909.4 and Rs.1201.1 correspondingly. The returns over cost-A1, cost-A2, cost-B1, cost-B2, cost-C1, cost-C2, and cost-C3 at overall farms level were accounted to be Rs. 254320.54, Rs. 254320.54, Rs. 248199.90, Rs. 164737.10, Rs. 241571.31, Rs. 158108.51 and Rs. 141219.38, respectively. It is observed that, for the farm as a whole, net present value was estimated to be 3,67,195.57 Rs. /ha. Further, internal rate of return was revealed to be 15.12. The benefit cost ratio was found to be 1.19, for the farm as a whole. The value of multiple determination was found to be 0.76, indicating there by 76 per cent variation in output explained jointly by 5 independent variables like manure, fertilizer, human labour, machine labour and seedlings under study. The regression coefficients of variables like fertilizer, human labour and seedlings were revealed as positive and significant, indicating there by 1 per cent increase in these inputs over their geometric mean would increase the yield by 0.07, 0.05 and 1.07 per cent sequentially. The regression coefficients of variables like manure and machine labour were observed to be positive, but non-significant. The sum of elasticities (bi) value was observed to be 1.18, showing increasing returns to scale, that in turn implies that, input resources were being underutilized. The marginal value productivities of manure, fertilizer, human labour, machine labour and seedlings were computed to be 3237.44, 1337.97, 16549.44, 21506.65 and 7397.01, correspondingly. The values of MVPx/MFCx of manure, fertilizer, human labour, hired labour and seedlings were 21.58, 55.75, 33.10, 28.68 and 73.97. Therefore, it is crystal clear from the discussion that the resources were underutilized and there is ample scope of further use of these inputs to raise the gross returns. The major constraints faced by the coconut growers for overall farms level were identified as the unavailability of credit, water scarcity, high labour wage rate, timely unavailability of labour and pest and disease attack.