Stakeholder analysis for enhancing the role primary producers in mango value chains

Abstract

India is the largest mango producing and the chief exporting country in the world with an annual mango production of 18 million metric tons, which accounts for about 50 per cent of the global mango supply. In total India has about 8.97 lakh ha dedicated to mango farming, out of which Kerala accounts for about 77.30 thousand ha under mango cultivation during 2014-’15. Muthalamada in Chittur taluk of Palakkad district, is known as the ‘Mango City’ of Kerala. The mango orchards in Muthalamada covers around 4000 hectares, with about 5000 mango cultivators. The annual production of mango in Muthalamada Panchayat is approximately 40,000 tonnes. However, the mango sector in Palakkad district is not devoid of any problems, which hinders its economic advancement. In this background, the present study entitled “Stakeholder analysis for enhancing the role of primary producers in mango value chain” was taken up in the Department of Agricultural Extension, College of Horticulture, Vellanikkara, during 2015-17. The study was formulated with the objectives to identify the stakeholders in mango value chains, their functions and value share, to analyze the institutions and its role in mango value chain, to identify the marketing channels utilized by the farmers, to examine the price spread and marketing efficiency of the farmers, to understand the constraints faced by the farmers and to suggest value chain enhancement measures in favor of producer farmers. Survey was carried out among the mango growers and other stakeholders in Muthalamada Panchayat. About 60 farmers and 30 stakeholders were randomly selected for the study. Stakeholder analysis, SWOC matrix analysis and Scenario analysis were carried out through group discussions. The results of the baseline information of the respondents revealed that the farmers with age in between 51 and 70 years depended on agriculture alone (64.70 per cent) and hence they were more cautious about marketing their produce. They marketed more than 75 per cent of their produce to distant markets such as Delhi, Mumbai, Ahmedabad, etc. The respondents had good educational status with experience of more than 20 years and medium extension contact. The farmers cultivating in leased land along with their own orchard (78.26 per cent) tend to go for combined cultivation practices. Two third of the respondents (68.62 per cent) possessing different areas relied on collection agent for marketing their produce as they are easily approachable and the farmers had to incur only transportation cost. The mango growers were well organized, with about 51 respondents (49 per cent) having membership in Farmer Producer Organization (FPO). Alphonso, Banganpally, Bennett Alphonso and Tottapuri are mainly preferred for cultivation as these varieties are having huge demand in both international as well as domestic markets. Stakeholder analysis according to importance- influence scoring revealed that intermediaries like mandi walas, trader, collection agent and pre-harvest contractor had more influence in the mango sector. The major institutions involved in mango value chain include Krishi Bhavan, State Horticulture Mission (SHM), APEDA (Agricultural and Processed Food Products Export Development Authority), FPOs (Farmer Producer Organizations), Chittur Agro Park and NABARD (National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development). The marketing channel utilized by the farmers varies according to the grade of the produce, grade 1 is the export quality, grade 2 is usually the undersized mangoes that does not fulfil the export requirement and grade 3 is malformed mangoes or mangoes having external discoloration, etc. In case of grade 1 mangoes both channel 1 and channel 2 were having marketing efficiency 0.14. Margin was highest for the wholesaler and the exporting agency for channel 1 and channel 2 respectively. For grade 2 mangoes, channel 4 was found to be more efficient (0.24) due to absence of an intermediary. Grade 3 mangoes are mainly sold at the local markets and for processing, wherein marketing of mangoes directly to local market was found to be efficient (0.4) whereas in case of processing involvement of too many intermediaries affects the efficiency of the marketing channel. The important factors affecting marketing efficiency according to binary logistic regression include experience, ownership, income source, type of cultivation, orchard type, credit source and marketing channel. A comparative study was made among two groups of farmers, group I comprising of farmers with less than 5 acres of land and group II encompassing farmers with more than 5 acres. The result highlighted that, cultivation type was significantly different for the respondents of the two groups. Major constraints faced by the farmers during marketing include poor availability of market information, absence of a common collection center, over dominance of middle men and deficit of timely labor. Finally, SWOC analysis and scenario analysis were conducted to arrive at strategic options. The strategic options developed from the study are enhancing value addition and product development, promotion of branding of the produce, to educate the farmers on building competitiveness and to increase export potential by addressing quality parameters.