Performance of agriculture in Sikkim: assessing the satisfaction of farmers
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Date
2019
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College of Post Graduate Studies in Agricultural Sciences, Central Agricultural University - Imphal
Abstract
The performance of the agricultural sector is often judged by the performance of the macro economic variables viz., growth in agricultural Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and its share in country’s GDP while overlooking the humane side of the production process. But, the question of wellbeing of the farmers matters for the real development as they are at the centre of production process. Sikkim is the first state in the country declared as an organic state in 2016. This is a partial deduction of the negative externalities from the Gross State Domestic Product (GSDP). Hence, the present study was carried out to assess the performance of agriculture sector of the state at macro level and to understand and quantify the satisfaction derived by the farmers from farming and overall life situation. Analysis of secondary data revealed that the share of agricultural Gross State Domestic Product (GSDP) to GSDP and Gross Capital Formation (GCF) in agriculture decreased over the years indicating the declining importance of agriculture in Sikkim’s economy, though the percentage of people depending on it has remained substantial. The net sown area decreased due to use of land for other purposes. The existing number of agricultural markets in the state was much lesser than the requirement. Hence, use of agricultural land for non-agricultural purpose should be discouraged and policies need to be initiated to attract capital and for strengthening marketing infrastructure. To study farmers’ satisfaction focus group discussions were followed by personal interviews covering total 70 farmers in East Sikkim and South Sikkim districts of Sikkim. Two approaches viz., receipt-expenditure approach and self-rating approach were applied. About 55.71% of the respondents had deficit farm receipts over its basic expenditure. Similarly, the self-rating approach also revealed that only 47.14% and 38.57% of the farmers were satisfied at farm input and output indicators, respectively, but when the subjective indicators related to farming were included, about 71.43% farmers were found to be satisfied at farming. Majority of the respondents (80%) were satisfied at their overall life due to their satisfaction at indicators included in life situation dimension. The inner happiness outweighed the shortcomings in income. Binary logit model revealed that ownership of livestock, cultivation of high value crops, subsidiary occupation, social group, land holdings, family size were the factors influencing the probability of being satisfied. Level of satisfaction at farming can be improved through premium pricing of organic produce and development of effective bio-pesticides.