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IASSI QUARTERLY: CONTRIBUTIONS TO INDIAN SOCIAL SCIENCE JOURNAL OF INDIAN ASSOCIATION OF SOCIAL SCIENCE INSTITUTIONS (IASSI) Volume 38 Number 3 July-September 2019 Contents Articles Determinants of Marketed Surplus of Food Crops – A Village Level Study 341 in the North 24 Parganas District of West Bengal Rupam Mukherjee Crime and State Level Per Capita Income: Exploring the Relationship 360 for Indian States Dipparna Jana An Empirical Study of Causes, Concerns and Impacts of Migration in India: 278 A Development Perspective and Implications Archana Sinha Seasonal Migration and Spatial Diversification in Rural Labour Market 399 Dinesh Kumar Nayak Understanding and Addressing Livelihood Problem of 423 Rag-Pickers in Surat City Vimal Trivedi Structure and Organisation of School Dental Health Service in the 438 School Health Programme of NRHM in West Tripura District Barnali Das Economic Growth and Environmental Degradation: A Cross Country Analysis 457 Subhrabaran Das and Monalisa Das Asset Management by SC Fishermen in Andhra Pradesh: A Quick Assessment 472 Srinivasa Reddy and K. Hanumantha Rao Impact of MNREGA on Rural Households: Selected GPs in (North) Karnataka 492 Pesala Peter and I. Maruthi Current Implementation and Impacts of MGNREGS in Rural Odisha: 506 Does this Solve the Problems of Unemployment and Migration? M Gopinath Reddy, Bishnu Prasad Mahapatra and Jogindra Naik Perspective Social Development: A Liberal Sociological Formulation 527 S.L. Sharma Book Review Transformation of Punjab State from Water Surplus to 538 Water Scarcity: A Book Review Sucha Singh Gill The Indian Association of Social Science Institutions (IASSI) gratefully acknowledges the grant received from the Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR), New Delhi towards the publication of the journal 'IASSI Quarterly: Contributions to Indian Social Science" Designations employed, presentation of the materials and opinions expressed in the papers in this publication do not necessarily represent the views of IASSI or ICSSR. IASSI Quarterly: Contributions to Indian Social Science, Vol. 38, No. 3, 2019 Determinants of Marketed Surplus of Food Crops – A Village Level Study in the North 24 Parganas District of West Bengal Rupam Mukherjee* The aim of this paper is to investigate how different socio economic factors affect market participation and marketed surplus of food crops in some selected villages of North 24 Parganas district of West Bengal in terms of a multiple regression model and to suggest different means of increasing the marketed surplus of food crops, which may enlighten the policy makers in fine-tuning their designs and applications. A systematic, multistage stratified sampling design was adopted to conduct a survey and responses of 100 farming households were documented in terms of a pre-tested structured questionnaire designed for the purpose. The study shows that the marketed surplus of food crops by farming households in the area of study increase with the increase in education of household head, perception of farmers regarding lagged market price of the product, landholding size and access to credit; whereas it falls with the increase in household size and distance from the market. All the results are statistically significant. The ‘t-test’ is also conducted to investigate significant difference in mean value for marketed surplus of food crops between farmers when they are divided into two groups based upon different categories defined by the explanatory variables considered in this study. Keywords: Marketed surplus, Food crops, Survey, Multiple regression, T-test I. INTRODUCTION Backdrop Agriculture is the lifeline of the Indian economy which keeps the economy going and growing. Increase in marketed surplus of food crops is essential to meet the constant challenge of food and nutritional security of the burgeoning population of the nation over time, control of food prices led inflation and to increase the foreign exchange earnings from export. Moreover, increase in purchasing power of the farmers from the sale of agricultural produces is conducive to widening the home market for industrial products and it helps in reducing the rural-urban divide in the distribution of income and wealth and migration of people from the rural to the urban sector. Marketed surplus is defined as the portion of production that actually enters the market irrespective of the farmers’ requirements for family consumption, farm * Assistant Professor, Department of Economics, Kabi Sukanta Mahavidyalaya, Bhadreswar, West Bengal. Email : [email protected] 342 IASSI Quarterly: Contributions to Indian Social Science requirements, social and religious payments. It also includes the distress sales. Thus, the marketed surplus may be more, less or equal to the marketable surplus of food crops in any year (Acharya & Negi, 2012). The small and marginal farmers have very less retention capacity of what they produce and usually sell a greater proportion of their output in the market. Sometimes, due to an urgent need for cash, they are forced to engage in distress sale and at that time their marketed surplus is more than the marketable surplus. Such farmers generally buy the produce from the market in a later period to meet their requirements. Marketed surplus is less than the marketable surplus when the farmers, especially larger ones with better retention capacity, hoard some of the marketable surpluses in anticipation of fetching higher prices in the future. Motivation Agriculture remains at the heart of the rural livelihoods even though the agrarian economy of the nation has changed in many dimensions since independence. The shift from subsistence farming to commercial farming and diversification of export basket of agricultural products are some key aspects of the transformation of Indian agriculture in recent times that had a critical impact on rural livelihoods. The proportion of agricultural production that is marketed by farmers has increased significantly from about 30 per cent during the early 1950s to more than 70 per cent in recent times (Sharma & Wardhan, 2017). In this context, the marketed surplus is proportionately higher in the case of commercial crops than subsistence crops. In order to maintain the balance between demand for and supply of food grains with the rapid increases in demand due to higher growth of population, urbanization, industrialization and overall economic development, accurate knowledge on marketed and marketable surplus is essential in the process of proper planning for the procurement, distribution, export and import of agricultural products (Malik & Singh, 1993). In this regard it is very important to analyze the factors that affect the growth of marketed surplus of agricultural produce for policy design of the government. Review of Literature Different studies have been conducted to identify the determinants of market participation and intensity of marketed surplus of agricultural produce by the farmers at different parts of the world. Tura, Goshu & Demisie (2016) studied the market options available to the teff farmers of Bacho and Dawo districts of Oromia state of Ethiopia and showed in terms of Double Hurdle model that market participation of smallholder farmers are significantly affected by access to credit, perception of farmers on lagged market price of teff, size of the family, agro-ecology, farm size and ownership of transport equipment. Another study was made by Amre Tesfaw (2013) in the upper watershed of the Blue Nile in North-Western Ethiopia for the pepper farmers and in Determinants of Marketed Surplus of Food Crops 343 terms of Heckman Two stage econometric model he showed that market participation of farmers and the amount of pepper sold in the market were significantly affected by the age and educational qualification of the household head, distance from the market centre, number of oxen owned by the farmers and non-farm income of the farmers. Kraybill, Bashaasha & Betz (2012), in terms of multiple regression models have shown that production and marketed surplus of food crops in Uganda are positively affected by improved seeds, agricultural assets and technological know-how of the farmer and the availability of credit. The study of Alam & Afruz (2002) has shown that the marketed surplus of some leading crops like different varieties of rice, wheat, potato mustard and lentil in Bangladesh is positively affected by the size of land holdings of farmers as well as the market price of those crops. In the Indian context, Dharam Narain (1961) found that marketed surplus as a proportion of the value of agricultural produce declines up to 10-15 acres size of land holdings, after which it shows a steady increase. According to Mathur & Ezekiel (1961), in poor nations like India, farmers sell that amount of output which gives them the amount of money they need to satisfy their given cash needs and retain the balance of output for their self-consumption. With the rise in the price of food grains, they sell a smaller quantity of food grains to get that fixed cash needs and vice versa. Krishna (1962, 1967) put forward the case for a positive relationship between price and marketed surplus of food grains in India. The study of Chattopadhyay & Sen (1988) showed that marketed surplus of subsistence crop depends positively on the size of landholdings as well as the size of the family. Reddy (1987) carried out a study for marketed surplus of paddy by size classes in Andhra Pradesh and found a larger proportion of marketed