|
Marketing of farm produce faulty
By Allah Rakha & Shahzad
Hussain
PAKISTAN is now shaking off age-old practices and adopting
some degree of scientific approach in agriculture. This
change has brought appreciable dividends to the big farmers
but the small ones have been left behind.
 As
the small farmers constitute the bulk of farming community
(about 75 per cent), and are engaged in agriculture not as a
profession but as a way of life, the constraints in
bettering their lot must be removed. It is, therefore,
necessary to modernise our agricultural marketing system,
giving top priority to the development of small farmers.
So, the government authorities — responsible for formulating
policies in various socio-economic fields – and concerned
related NGOs should endavour to improve the marketing system
with special treatment to be given to the farmers having
limited resources to carry on their operations efficiently.
Almost majority of experts and consultants, both foreign and
local, are of the view that to obtain the desired outcomes
it is necessary that marketing improvements may be made
distinctly at policy, managerial and grass-root/farm levels.
At the policy level, it is necessary to formulate an
effective medium-term policy on agricultural marketing under
which various components of marketing programmes and
activities can be integrated and coordinated.
At managerial level, the management and technical
capabilities of technical bodies, involved in the
implementation of the marketing policies, should be improved
to enable work to be carried out more efficiently and
economically.
While pursuing the official socio-economic objectives at
grass-root/farm level, the marketing policies and programmes
should assist farmers in selling their produce, purchasing
their inputs and raising their incomes.
At this level, the government policies and programmes often
lose their impact, especially for those farmers whose
marketable surplus is too small and least market-oriented.
Many rural development projects and programmes designed for
the benefit of small farmers fail because of market-related
problems.
 The
most critical problem is the lack of marketing extension
service. Although crop production extension services do
exist at the village and farm level to a certain degree,
marketing extension work designed to provide guidance to
particularly small farmers does not exist. To establish and
strengthen field level marketing extension service is an
important priority area so as to make government efforts in
marketing effective at the village level and to provide
direct benefit to the small farmers.
Typical problems faced by the small farmers in dealing with
the marketing of their comparatively small quantities of
produce mostly relate to: production-orientation; small
marketable surplus; inefficient produce preparation;
ineffective rural assembly markets; lack of credit
availability, group action and vertical co-ordination of
marketing channels.
Production-orientation: Many farmers, especially the small
ones adapt more slowly to changes in marketing. They produce
crops or products that they have been producing
traditionally since long. Naturally, they try to find
markets for their produce only when the market requires
improved or entirely different produce. It is essential that
marketability be considered along with the production
planning. This is particularly relevant for the highly
perishable produce such as fruits and vegetables where
variety, quality and timings of supplies matter so much.
Small marketable surplus: A critical marketing problem for
the small farmers is his small marketable surplus. Often he
does not produce sufficient cereals even for his own family
consumption or has only a small surplus to sell. He may
produce cash crops for the market such as sugarcane,
tobacco, oilseeds etc., but the quantity harvested from his
small landholding, is still too small for efficient
marketing.
For effective marketing, the economy of scale is a critical
element. A small marketable surplus implies a weaker basis
to bargain with merchants or wholesalers. Direct marketing
by small farmers thus becomes impracticable because of high
marketing costs. Therefore, small farmers have to depend
traditionally on village assembly traders or itinerant
merchants to market the produce.
Even when the farmers are aware of an opportunity of getting
better price by selling their produce somewhere else, the
traditional “customers relationship” established with
certain other traders, prohibits the farmers from seeking a
more advantageous alternative opportunity.
Inefficient preparation: Due partly to the small marketable
surplus and partly to lack of awareness, the inefficient
marketing practices employed by the small farmers, result in
higher post-harvest losses, higher marketing costs and lower
prices. Efficient methods for harvesting, sorting, grading,
storage and packaging are essential. Without such efficient
methods, the small farmers are bound to receive lower prices
resulting in their weak competitive position.
Ineffective rural assembly markets: At various places,
periodic (five days or weekly) rural markets are held which
are mostly patronised, per force by circumstances, by small
farmers. Such markets serve as assembly points that are
linked with large secondary markets or urban wholesale
markets.
Some bigger farmers with larger marketable surpluses bypass
the rural periodic markets. The small farmers remain the
main users of rural markets, both for disposing their small
marketable surpluses to meet immediate cash requirements as
well as for procuring daily necessities such as clothing,
salt, shoes and other consumer’s items. Most rural markets
have no marketing facilities such as storage and many do not
even have the shelters. Malpractices such as under-weighing,
dubious sale and weighing practices are freely used against
the interests of the farmer-sellers.
Credit availability: The Agricultural Development Bank of
Pakistan (ADBP) and commercial banks provide credit to the
farmers on completion of a number of formalities against
acceptable collaterals. In principle, such loans are
available to small farmers as well. But in practice it is
pretty difficult for them to obtain the required loan on
time with the result that small farmers are unable to bring
any improvement in their operations and ultimately to
enhance incomes.
The two loan-giving agencies do not advance marketing loans.
Thus, the farmers, in particular, the small ones, deal with
the commission agents and wholesalers to obtain the
marketing credit from them usually on terms not favourable
to the farmers.
Lack of group action: For obtaining the benefits of economy
of scale, group action is a critical factor to successful
small farmer’s marketing. Unfortunately, co-operative effort
has not been successful in agricultural field due to various
reasons. The farmers have no hesitation in joining action
groups for various socio-religious activities or for various
crop production operations such as labour-sharing in
planting and harvesting. But when it comes to economic
functions such as marketing, the response of the farmers is
not encouraging. Here the group actin should be better
understood by its members and management should be
relatively more ‘sophisticated’.
Lack of co-ordination: The success of marketing by small
farmers depends on the degree of vertical “co-ordination in
the marketing channels”. Some marketing functions often
focus only on one link of the marketing system. As such
uncoordinated marketing channels are a great constraint on
small farmers’ development.
Even the most ambitious and reasonable pricing and marketing
policies of the government have not produced tangible
results in increasing the incomes of small farmers, mainly
due to the absence of an effective field-level marketing
system.
It may be emphatically stated that the establishment of
ever-important field-oriented marketing extension system (so
far conspicuous by its absence in Pakistan), especially
designed to assist the small farmers is a critical factor in
making rural development programme a success.
Courtesy: The DAWN
|
Pakissan.com;
|
