Raka Saxena

Effect of arbuscular mycorrhizal inoculations on seedling growth and biomass productivity of two bamboo species.

A study was conducted to identify suitable arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungi for inoculation of Bambusa bambos and Dendrocalamus strictus at nursery stage for increasing growth and productivity. Twelve AM species, isolated from bamboo and other common trees of Bundelkhand were used for inoculations. In B. bambos, total dry weight and phosphorus (P) uptake were significantly increased by all studied fungi and shoot length was increased by eight AM inoculants. Maximum mycorrhizal dependency (MD) was recorded for Acaulospora scrobiculata (44.2%), followed by Glomus cerebriforme (41.6%) and G. intraradix (41.0%). In D. strictus, all tested AM inoculants significantly increased shoot length, dry shoot weight and P uptake, except Glomus 1. Dry root weight was significantly increased by only two inoculants namely, G. cerebriforme and G. etunicatum. Total dry weight was significantly increased by eight AM fungi. Maximum MD was recorded for G. cerebriforme (62.9%), followed by G. diaphanum (55.0%) and G. etunicatum (51.3%). Thus, the results showed that utilization of effective AM fungi can enhance the productivity of bamboo in the region.

Innovations in agricultural marketing: a case study of e-tendering system in Karnataka, India

This paper analyses the effectiveness and challenges of e-tendering marketing system with a focus on pigeon pea. The results indicate that e-tendering has been successful in reducing transaction time, bringing transparency in price discovery and increasing market revenue, besides enhancing market competition. The system, however, has not been effectively implemented among all the markets because of traders’ resistance. By identifying the factors behind the success of e-tendering in some markets and the lack thereof in others, we provide certain key insights into obstacles in successful implementation of innovative marketing reforms with specific reference to the e-National Agricultural Market (e-NAM).

Doubling Farmers’ Income in India by 2022–23: Sources of Growth and Approaches§

The target of doubling farmers’ income in a short period requires identification of sources of income growth and enabling conditions for harnessing their growth potential. Agriculture is the main source of farmers’ income in India, and in this paper, we examine the sources of agricultural growth, and suggest technological, institutional policy options for making agriculture a remunerative enterprise. Technology is identified as one the most important sources of growth, and there are sufficient evidences to show that investment in agricultural research yields good dividends. There exist huge gaps between realized and potential yields of most crops that can be bridged to a large extent by enhancing farmers’ access to key inputs, irrigation, markets, credit and extension services. Diversification of production portfolio towards high-value crops has considerable potential to accelerate growth in agriculture and farmers’ income. However, extreme volatility in prices acts as disincentive to adopt productivity-enhancing technologies and diversification. Post-harvest management and small-scale processing would help farmers capture benefits of value addition. Effective coordination between centre and states is important in mainstreaming and channelizing policies and investment to achieve the target of doubling farmers’ income.

Technology-Policy Tradeoff in Doubling Farmers’ Income: A Case Study on Pulses

The paper has studied technology-policy tradeoff in doubling the income of farmers by selecting pulses, arhar and gram. The study has revealed that making available the existing technologies and factors at further scale to farmers through bridging yield gaps would greatly help in increasing the output at farm level. The study has shown that a slight increase in MSP and FHP can double the real income of the gram and arhar growing farmers by 2022. The scenario analysis has indicated that the real ‘gross’ income in arhar can be doubled just by achieving yield levels of 24 q/ha in Maharashtra and 14 q/ha in Madhya Pradesh and Karnataka by the year 2022, and letting the MSP and FHPs to increase by 10 per cent a year. An increase in FHPs by 420/q, 646/q and 211/q, respectively in Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and Rajasthan above the presumed 10 per cent increase a year for the given yield levels of 12–14 q/ha would double the real ‘gross’ income by 2022. Further, estimates have indicated that levels of cost increase that would allow doubling both ‘gross’ and ‘net’ real income levels are 28 per cent, 29 per cent and 34 per cent in Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and Rajasthan for gram, and 21 per cent, 27 per cent and 23 per cent in Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh and Karnataka for arhar, respectively.

Can Livestock Sector be the Game Changer in Enhancing the Farmers’ Income? Reinvesting Thrust with Special Focus on Dairy Sector

The livestock sector provides promising opportunities and is assumed to bring desired growth in farmers’ income, especially in less and poor endowed regions. The present study has delineated the entire country into four zones, viz. Least Performing Zone (LPZ), Average Performing Zone (APZ), Good Performing Zone (GPZ) and Well Performing Zone (WPZ) based on district level livestock income for effective policy formulation and implementation. The drivers of livestock income were identified through multiple regression framework for regional interventions. Crossbred adoption and crossbred milk yield with elasticity of 0.09 and 0.42, respectively, are found to significantly contribute to enhancing livestock income. Thus, crossbreeding should be geared up especially in LPZ as an income enhancement strategy. The buffalo farming has emerged as an important contributor in raising farmers’ income through meat production. The productivity enhancement strategy for buffaloes along with indigenous cattle will be a win-win situation as these animals are well adapted to tropical climate of the country. Further, special attention is required for strengthening marketing network through co-operatives for better procurement and prices with utmost priority in LPZ, as only 12 per cent of milk produced is sold to the co-operatives. The state governments in conjunction with all stakeholders, including research institutions and private players have to play a catalytic role in mainstreaming the livestock development, especially in the identified disadvantageous regions/zone as an entry point for the socio-economic upliftment of the region as well as the nation as a whole.

How equipped are the regulated agricultural markets? evidences based on selected markets in Uttarakhand

The study compared the status of market infrastructure across the selected regulated markets of Uttarakhand by market infrastructure development index computed for three categories viz., trade infrastructure, storage infrastructure and support infrastructure. Haldwani emerges as the best-equipped market as per the combined index (score of 0.62) and also outscores highest among the trade, storage and support infrastructural categories. Kashipur stands next in the category due to its better positioning in trade infrastructure while Dehradun scores low in the combined index due to poor trade and storage infrastructure despite standing second in the infrastructure support category. A positive and significant association was noticed between the commodity arrivals (potato and tomato) and market infrastructure categories. A panel regression analysis between potato arrivals, price, and market Dummies reveals that price has no time varying effect on the arrival of potato, but showed a significant and positive relationship between the markets and arrival reflecting the dependence of arrivals on market attributes.

How Price Signals in Pulses are Transmitted across Regions and Value Chain? Examining Horizontal and Vertical Market Price Integration for Major Pulses in India

The paper has applied time series model to investigate the wholesale and retail price market integration of major pulses (tur, gram, moong, urad, masoor) in five major regions namely north zone (NZ), south zone (SZ), east zone (EZ), west zone (WZ) and north east zone (NEZ) in the country based on their volume of production. The study has shown that there exists a strong cointegration among the wholesale as well as retail prices of these major pulses, although the cointegration varies. In addition to the horizontal cointegration, the vertical cointegration between the wholesale and retail prices of different pulses has also been investigated. Different causal relationships have been found between wholesale and retail prices in these five zones. The application of vector error correction model (VECM) has indicated that all the error correction terms (ECTs) are negative and most of these terms are statistically significant, implying that the system once in dis-equilibrium tries to come back to the equilibrium situation. The study has also used Impulse response analysis which shows that change in wholesale prices of these five pulses in one zone will cause change in wholesale prices in other zones. The paper has concluded that price signals are transmitted across regions indicating that price changes in one zone are consistently related to price changes in other zones and are able to influence the prices in other zones. However, the direction and intensity of price changes may be affected by the dynamic linkages between the demand and supply of pulses. The study has provided an interesting insight for policy makers, and for contributing to improve the information precision to predict the price movements used by marketing operators for their strategies and by policy makers for designing the suitable marketing strategies to bring more efficiency across the markets.

Strengthening Bilateral Trade Relations between India And Iran: Opportunities in Livestock Sector

Livestock sector is an important component of the both, Indian and Iranian economy. Due to highly protected livestock markets in the developed countries and rapidly increasing demand for livestock products and inputs in Asian countries, these nations are preferred destinations of livestock products’ trade. This study identifies the potential livestock products and inputs based on Iranian and Indian trade data. The potential of Indian exports to Iran lies in the meat of bovine animals, especially frozen and boneless and also fresh and chilled boneless meat, skimmed milk powder, butter and fat-based products, birds egg in shell, carded or combed fine animal hair, combed wool in fragments and wool tops, and vaccines for veterinary medicine. The Iranian exports to India can be enhanced in raw skins of sheep or lamb with or without wool on, tanned or crust hides and skins of bovine or equine animals, in wet or dry state, tanned or crust hides and skins of sheep and lambs without wool in wet or dry state, greasy wool and degreased wool not carded or combed.