Farmer Producer Organizations: Implications for Agricultural Extension

Abstract

The Government of India recently announced $34 million for setting up a “Producers Development and Upliftment Corpus (PRODUCE)” under the National Bank for Agricultural and Rural Development (NABARD). Marketing of agricultural produce is a complex process in India. Farmers do not have access to market, they are selling their produce to the intermediaries operate in the market because of this their profit margin is reduced and their farming business becomes a non-viable one. We can mobilize farmers in groups and build their associations called as Farmer Producer Organization (FPOs). FPO is a means to bring together the small and marginal farmers and other small producers to build their own business enterprise that will be managed by professionals. FPO offer small farmers to participate in the market more effectively and help to enhance agricultural production, productivity and profitability. This paper examines current mode of operation of FPO and effectiveness of the FPO with reference to the small farmers in India. This article studies the potential role of Farmer Producer Organisations (POs; and more generally, Producer Organisations) in the context of large prevalence of smallholder agriculture in India.