Economics of production and value addition to soybean in Madhya Pradesh
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Date
2009
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Publisher
UAS, Dharwad
Abstract
Soybean is known as the “golden bean”, “miracle crop” etc., because of its several
uses. The present utilization pattern of soybean in India indicated that 85 per cent used for oil
extraction, 10 per cent for seed and only 5 per cent for food and feed. Therefore, processing is
an important function of soybean. In recent years jowar and maize in rainfed areas have been
competing with soybean in Madhya Pradesh. In the present study effort is made to study
profitability of soybean vis-à-vis its competing crops in addition to value addition. The study
indicated that net returns in soybean over jowar (868.72%) and maize (121.67%) were
significantly higher. Similarly, benefit cost ratio over Cost C was higher in case of soybean
(1.29) than that of maize (1.16) and jowar (1.05) which clearly indicated that soybean
cultivation was more profitable than any of competing crops. For every rupee investment in
soymilk and tofu processing, Rs. 1.42 was obtained as returns, indicating its profitability.
Benefit cost ratio was more than unity (1.18) showing profitability of converting soybean into
soyflour. In this regard, there is need to understand the profitability of soybean as whole
pulse as well as processed soy products. Therefore, in the present study, an attempt is made to
find out the economics of soybean production and its value addition in Madhya Pradesh state.
An assessment of profitability of processing of soybean into different value added products
clearly indicated that the processing units involved in processing soymilk and tofu together
were more profitable than those involved in processing of soybean into soyflour only. Since
the value addition is profitable over raw soybean, farmers may be motivated to take up value
addition to soybean. Further, small scale entrepreneurs may be encouraged to establish the
above enterprises for widening the soybean industry.
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Keywords
Agricultural Economics