Project Work

Instability of commodity prices has always been a major concern of the producers as well as the consumers in an agriculture dominated country like India. Farmers in a bid to avert the price risk often tend to go for distress sale and thereby reducing the potential returns. In order to cope up with this problem, futures trading has emerged as a viable option and serves as a risk-shifting function. This study has analyzed the movement of futures and spot prices or co-integration in castor and the data were collected from July, 2004 to December, 2013. The ADF (Augmented Dickey Fuller) test has been used to check the stationarity of the time series data and it followed the stationarity pattern at the first difference. The cointegration test has been used to find out whether there existed a long-run relationship between spot and futures prices and it behaves in an expected manner. The result of Granger test detected unidirectional Granger Causality from futures to spot markets. This phenomenon of price convergence and causality indicated its better hedging efficiency for farmers and exporters to mitigate the price risk.

An attempt has been made to see the effect of minimum support price (MSP) and farm harvest price (FHP) on area of major food grain crops such as paddy, jowar, maize, bajra, tur, wheat, and gram. Th results revealed that MSP and FHP for all the selected crops were significantly correlated in positive direction. Similarly, compound growth rate of MSP and FHP for all the crops were also found positive and significant staistically. In the case of area the positive and significant growth rate was found for paddy, wheat and gram crops and negative growth rate was found for bajra crop. Further, it was observed that there was no significant impact of MSP and FHP on area of major food grain crops except Bajra crop for which the regression coefficient of MSP was found to be negative and statistically significant. This indicated that there was negative impact of MSP on area of Bajra crop.

Groundnut as “King of Oilseeds” is one of the third largest oilseed produced in the world and second largest in India. India is the largest cultivator of groundnut crop in world in terms of acreage, low yields kept her in the second place in terms of output. China is the single largest producer as well as consumer of groundnut in the world. Area under groundnut crop declined in recent 6 years with 3.37 per cent growth rate due to increase in area under its main kharif competitor crop cotton. Production and yield increased with 4.68 and 6.51 per cent growth rate annually. Gujarat is the leading producer (50 per cent of total production) of best quality groundnut followed by Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu and Rajasthan. Major exporters are India, which accounts for 36 per cent of world exports followed by USA, Argentina and China. During last decade groundnut export quantity and value was increased with 14.26 and 24.87 per cent growth rate annually. India's major export destinations are Indonesia, Vietnam, Malaysia, UAE, Philippines and Thailand. In the year 2011–12, the export quantity and value was highest after that due to poor quality issues (presence of aflatoxin content) the export was declined in next subsequent 3 years. So, there is a need to focus on quality of Groundnut as many importing countries are applying stringent norms regarding quality standards.

This study has analyzed the futures and spot price relations in castor and the data were collected from NCDEX for a period of 10 years i.e. July, 2004 to December, 2013. The results revealed that volume of castor traded in NCDEX has increased during the recent times indicating the increasing information flow into the markets. Analysis of price volatility has revealed its persistence in spot and futures prices as the sum of the coefficient of ARCH (a) and GARCH (â) were estimated closer to one. The ADF (Augmented Dickey Fuller) test has been used to check the stationarity of the time series data and it follows the stationarity pattern at the first difference. The spot and futures prices were found to be co-integrated assessed through Johansen Co-integration test. The result of Granger test detects unidirectional Granger Causality from futures to spot markets, which indicates its better hedging efficiency for farmers and exporters to mitigate the price risk. This study broadly inferre...

Food processing industry in India is a sunrise sector and has gained prominence over the recent years. It is one of the largest industries and ranks fifth in terms of production, consumption, export and expected growth. It has tremendous export potential, as processed agricultural food items registered 9.61 per cent and 21.56 per cent growth in export quantity and value, during the period of 10 years. The share of processed agri. food items in total export and agri. export was 1.1 per cent and 24 per cent. India's export of Processed Agricultural Food products was 26067.64 crores in the year 2015–16. There is a need to cover this untapped potential of food processing sector through export promotion or incentives and by providing better infrastructure like-storage and processing facilities to reduce wastages as India is second largest producer of fruits and vegetables.

Climate change is a global environmental challenge that is threatening sustainable development around the world. This paper looks at diversification as a key factor in reducing risk and means of coping with an uncertain climate. The time series data on area, production and productivity of major crops of Gujarat State were collected from the website www.agri.gujarat.gov.in for the period from 2001–02 to 2014–15 and analyzed using different statistical tools like-CGR, Instability Index, Diversification Index, etc. This paper revealed that acreage under major food-gains like wheat and rice, most of cash crops and all the horticultural crops were increased whereas acreage under all coarse cereals, pulses, oilseeds was declined, which was mainly due to increase in rainfall (in cotton growing area), irrigation facility, high prices and introduction of Bt cotton variety. These all reasons were related to climactic factors directly or indirectly. High growth and low instability i.e. in case of major cereals, cash crops and horticultural crops shows risk security of farmers in terms of economic returns as well as in terms of climactic adaptation. Amongst the different regions, North Gujarat reported the highest level of crop diversification followed by Middle Gujarat, South Gujarat and Saurashtra-Kutch. The pre dominant crop like cotton and groundnut in Saurashtra-Kutch was responsible for low level of diversification in the region. Overall, Gujarat state reported a moderately high level of crop diversification but it was slightly declined during last decade, which secured farmers against climate risk.

The impact of drip irrigation technology in banana cultivation on input use and productivity was studied by collecting data from 120 drip farms and 120 non-drip farms of Anand and Vadodara districts during 2017-18. It was revealed from the study that per ha cost of cultivation of banana i.e. cost C2 was slightly less i.e. Rs 205190.4 under drip method of irrigation whereas under conventional method, it was Rs 212972.8. The average yield per ha i.e. 785.68 quintal and net gains over cost C2 per ha i.e. Rs 330924.4 was higher for drip irrigated farms as compared to conventional banana growers, in which average yield per ha was 660.15 quintal and net gains over cost C2 was Rs 239536.4. The yield and net profit were found significantly higher (about 19% and 38%) on drip farms over conventionally irrigated farms, which indicated that productivity was higher in drip method due to efficient use of inputs or resources. Due to drip irrigation system resources were saved over conventionally i...

Indian spices are popularly known for their flavour and aroma in domestic as well as in the international markets. Out of the total spices production, Indian households consume about 70-75 per cent either in whole form or in value added form (powder or masalas), 5-10 per cent is utilized by oleoresins, pharmaceuticals and cosmetics companies, 15-20 per cent is exported and the remaining 5 per cent goes for seed purposes (www.commodityindia.com). Increased production and trade balance in terms of export and import are required to support economic growth through agriculture. The present study focused on analysing the growth and instability in area, production and exports of major spices from India. The results showed that India's overall export and agricultural export both increased at 6.50 and 6.16 per cent annual growth rate from 2010-11 to 2019-20, respectively. India's agricultural export share to overall export has grown from 9.71 per cent in 2010-11 to 11.40 per cent in ...