Problems and Prospect of Cooperate Management of Farm Resources: A Case Study of an Indian Village

Joginder Singh and R.K. Lekhi Ahsas
Department of Economics and Sociology, Punjab Agricultural University

Abstract

A large chunk of Indian population (about three-fourth) is dependent upon agriculture. Majority of the farms are small. Therefore, diseconomies of small scale are of great concern for the economy as a whole. Some isolated attempts were made to bring the management of farms under cooperative system which could not meet the desired success due to a variety of reasons especially due to over-administration by government officials, underfinancing and lack of proper management.

In Punjab State of India, the farm size situation is slightly better, still about 45% farms are of less that two hectares. But due to concerted research efforts, policy measures and better entrepreneurship of farmers, the state has excelled all other states of the country in the agricultural development. Still, a number of studies have shown imbalanced and uneconomical use of farm resources.

This paper brings out the impact of joint management on farm income, employment and resource use efficiency on Punjab farms and the problems associated with such venture. The study was confined to Sandhaur village which depicts the average agroeconomic conditions of the state.

The analysis to bring out the optimum farm plans by LP-method was carried out for all farm situations separately and joint analysis by pooling all the available farm resources of the village. The main findings are:

1. The optimum plan of all the individual farm situations of the village together showed an improvement in the existing farm income by 32%. This was made possible by improved cropping pattern, higher cropping intensity, better use of tractor, other farm machinery, irrigation water and labour resource.
2. When the farm resources of the village were pooled, the joint venture at optimum level further improved the overall income by 27%. This increase came mainly from improved use of available farm machinery which was underutilised on separate farm situations. Similarly, relieving the bullock power and thus area under fodder for animals to be utilised for commercial crops too added to net income significantly.
3. The labour available in the farm sector became surplus under joint management. However, the use machinery and other form of capital increased.

In the context of recent liberalization of world trade, the attainment of resource use efficiency is essential which has clearly been highlighted by the results of the study. The labour which becomes surplus by joint management of farms ca be wisely absorbed in the possible vertical expansion of such ventures towards agro-industries and orderly marketing. The requirement of capital mainly the operational capital would increase which has to be met from external sources in the first phase.