A Study on the Impact of Farmer Producer Organisations on its Member Respondents in Puri District of Odisha

Abstract

ndia has over 92 million small holdings or nearly 21% of the world’s small 
holdings of 450 million, the second largest after China. Collectivization of producers, 
especially small and marginal farmers, into producer organizations is emerging as one of the 
most effective pathways to address the many challenges of agriculture and most importantly, 
improved access to investments, technology and inputs and markets. The present study 
entitled “Impact analysis of Farmer Producer Organizations (FPOs) on vegetable farmers of 
Puri district of “Odisha” was carried out from September 2019 to July 2020 with a 
perceptual analysis among the member respondents (vegetable farmers) of FPOs of Puri 
district with a total sample size of 131 respondents selected through proportionate random 
sampling from three active FPOs comprised of 1310 vegetable farmers of the district in an 
intention to find out the socio economic profiles of members of farmer producer 
organisation, its impact and constraints faced by the respondents. The study found that only 
8.41 percent (11 numbers) of the respondents were illiterate and rest were having education 
from primary level to graduation and above. The result revealed that only 18.32 percent (24 
numbers) of the respondents had high extension contact whereas 63.36 percent (83 numbers) 
and 18.32 percent (24 numbers) of the respondents had medium and low level of extension 
contact respectively. The impact analysis of FPOs found higher mean score in knowledge 
development (mean = 2.11) followed by social development (mean=1.98). A majority of 76.34 
percentage of member respondents showed medium level technical development followed by 
14.5 percentage in high level and only 9.16 percentage in low level of technical development. 
The members indicated a remarkable increase in their production (mean score=2.504) 
followed by lower input cost (2.481) and decrease in transaction cost (2.458. The 
independent variables like average annual income and extension contact showed positive 
significant association with the technical development due to FPO. About 96.18 percentage 
member respondents fully agreed on prevalence of insufficient storage facilities followed by 
lack of awareness on importance of grading and packaging (77.86%) and computer Illiteracy 
(74.05%) while 66.36 and 55.73 percentage member respondents agreed on the constraints, 
insufficient training and services and difficulties in following recommended practices 
respectively. The member respondents perceived major marketing constraints (mean score= 
2.55) followed by technical constraints (2.418) and economic constraints (2.35). Due to 
major marketing constraints, the farmers were still far away in getting remunerative prices 
for their produce, which need to be restructured to make higher impact on vegetable farmers.