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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: Madan, Manikant × End date: 2019 × Start date: 2019 × Thesis Type: M.Sc ×
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    ThesisItemOpen Access
    Economics of Potato cultivation in Nalanda district of Bihar
    (Dr. Rajendra Prasad Central Agricultural University, Pusa, Samastipur (Bihar), 2019) Madan, Manikant; Singh, K.M.
    The present study aims at economics of potato cultivation in Nalanda district of Bihar has been under taken to examine the trend in area, production and productivity of potato, cost and returns structure, price spread in marketing of potato and major constraints in potato production. The study based on primary as well as secondary data was carried out in four selected villages from two blocks of selected districts. A sample of 100 farmers constituting 25 farmers from each village selected randomly. Compound growth rates of area, production and productivity of potato were computed for different periods under consideration for the study area i.e. Nalanda district as well as for the state of Bihar as a whole. For the overall period (2001-2 to 2016-17), Potato registered annual growth rate of 2.61 percent in area, 5.63 percent in production and 2.95 percent in productivity in the state and similar trend was observed in the study area i.e. in Nalanda district, an annual growth rate of 5.68 percent in area, 7.95 percent in production and 2.15 percent in yield was recorded under investigation. The values were statistically significant. It is remarkable that in overall period area, production and productivity in the study area and state as a whole registered positive annual growth. Period wise results of trend analysis revealed that growth rate of area under potato was positive in the state during period-I (2001-02 to 2005-06) and in period-III (2011-12 to 2016-17), growth rate area under potato crop in the study area was found to be positive in period-II (2006-07 to 2010-11) and negative in period-I and period-III. On an average, per hectare total cost for potato cultivation was worked out to be Rs 144721.48. Per hectare operational cost was 78.65 per cent and per hectare overhead cost came out to be 21.35 per cent of the total cost. It was observed that the proportion of operational cost increased and overhead cost decreased as the size of farm increased. Input-wise analysis showed that human labour was the most important item of expenditure among various components of operational cost with 31.66 per cent share in total cost. It was followed by seed cost which worked out to be 24.07 per cent of the total cost. Farm-size-wise analysis of total cost of cultivation of potato indicated that, the total cost of cultivation was increased with size of farm increases. On an average, per hectare yield of potato came to 236.04 quintals, per hectare net income received by potato growers was Rs.110520.28; output- input ratio was 1.76. Inter-farm size wise analysis indicated that proportion of marketable surplus increased with increasing farm size. It was 97.49 per cent in case of marginal farms, 99.16 per cent in case of small farms, 99.68 per cent in case of medium farms and for large farms it was still higher, i.e. 99.84 per cent. Three channels were identified through which potato passed from point of production to the point of consumption. The data related to price spread in different channels showed that share of producer in consumer‘s price was higher (89.91 per cent) in Channel I, than that in Channel II (70.54 per cent) and Channel III (62.93 per cent) respectively. It was further observed that share of marketing cost in consumer‘s price was much lower in Channel I ( 10.09 per cent) than that in Channel II and Channel III( i.e. 19.52 per cent and 22.85 per cent) respectively. Marketing margin was higher in Channel III (14.22 per cent) than Channel II (9.94 per cent) respectively. It was further revealed that marketing efficiency for Channel I, Channel II and Channel III was 8.91, 2.39 and 1.69 respectively. It is amply clear from the table that marketing Channel I operated more efficiently in comparison with the other two channels (Channel II and Channel III). The problems faced by the sample potato growers throughout the production process, labour scarcity in peak season was considered as major problem with 71.13 average score in garret ranking. Lack of awareness regarding market price of potato was considered as the most important problem faced by the potato growers during marketing of potato.