INCOME-CENTRIC AGRICULTURE: A MULTISTAKEHOLDER ANALYSIS
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Date
2019
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DIVISION OF AGRICULTURAL EXTENSION ICAR-INDIAN AGRICULTURAL RESEARCH INSTITUTE NEW DELHI
Abstract
Agriculture development in India has made great strides in achieving national food
security. But this production-centric approach failed to recognise the need to improve
the farmer’s economic condition. A need is felt now by everyone to shift our attention
to enhancing farm profits. To address farmers’ income related issues, the present study
entitled “Making Agriculture Income-Centric: A Multi-Stakeholder Analysis” was
conducted to analyse the perception of farmers towards agriculture being remunerative
and find possible pathways for making agriculture income-centric through multiple
perspectives of various stakeholders. The study was conducted in four districts of
Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. A random sample of 120 farmers, bankers, students,
scientists, economists, extension personnel and KVK staff (20 each) were selected for
this study to obtain their views and suggestions. Personal interviews were used for data
collection. Majority of farmers were illiterate, had no access to weather forecast, had
moderate levels of risk orientation, innovative proneness, economic motivation,
scientific orientation, management orientation and achievement motivation. Only 39
percent farmers had low extension contact and mass media. The perception of farmers
about agriculture being remunerative was operationally defined as their agreement and
disagreement on the statements of different aspects of agriculture today. Factor analysis
yielded five factors: (i) Hopeful that agriculture would become remunerative through
exploiting innovations and market potential, (ii) Hopeful that agriculture would become
remunerative through exploding government schemes and diversification, (iii)
Agriculture as a poor profession, (iv) Hopeless about agriculture becoming
remunerative, and (v) Helpless that agriculture can never become remunerative. The
assessment of current economic status of farmers in the study area indicted that about
two-thirds of the respondents were small farmers having 1 to 2 ha of land, earning very
low income ranging from Rs.5000 to Rs.35000 per annum and also having very low
expenditure of Rs.8000 to Rs.38000 per annum. About 47 percent farmers took loans
from nationalised banks and 35 percent from moneylenders. Only 40 percent farmers
were saving money for different purposes and could save only Rs.5000 per annum.
Regression analysis of amount of savings indicated that education, land size, social
participation, annual expenditure, economic motivation, scientific orientation, need for
achievement and management orientation were found to affect significantly the amount
of savings by farmers. The analysis of current themes of thoughts on enhancing
farmers’ income indicated that there is a need for shift from production-centric
approach to income-centric approach for better agricultural development. More focus
needed on post-harvest management, processing and value addition, higher resource
use efficiency, market infrastructure, increasing share of producer in consumer rupee,
diversifying both crops and farms, helping farmers to organise into FPOs for better
prices. Redesigning land leasing laws and redefining mandate of agriculture is
imperative to make farming more income-centric. The constraints faced by farmers in
getting higher income are: erratic rainfall, severe droughts, uncertainty in yield and
market prices, lack of knowledge about market, consumer preferences, grading and
standardisation procedure, non-availability of processing units, moneylenders and
higher interest and minimum time given for loan repayment. In addition, being unable
to decide the prices of their produce for sale, glut in market are other constraints.
Analysis of stakeholders’ views indicated the suggestions as: diversified cropping,
organic farming, production of own seeds, smart farming, treating farming as business,
improving productivity and resource use efficiency, improving market infrastructure,
announcement of agriculture as an industry, remunerative prices for all crops and all
regions, development of supply chain management. Giving more focus on youth for
mentoring and attracting them to agriculture, provision of location specific innovative
technological options, bringing knowledge and awareness about ongoing schemes and
their proper implementation were other suggestions given by the six types of
stakeholders. Thus the study concluded that even though farmers are not getting
adequate income from farming, there is still a great scope to help farmers to get higher
income through integrated efforts, market reforms and infrastructure for agroprocessing and value addition and thus agriculture can be made remunerative.
Description
T-10091
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