(Small) Farmer Livelihoods under Liberalised Agricultural Market Environment in India: Can Farmer Producer Companies be an Alternative?

Abstract

This article examines the rationale and experience of Farmer Producer Companies (FPCs) in the context of their promotion and public funding on a large scale. Simultaneously, corporate players have been provided a larger and free space under the APLM and CF&S Acts of 2017 and 2018, respectively. At the state level, the agricultural market reforms started with the model APMC Act of 2003, and the Producer Companies Act was passed in 2002. India is the second Asian country after Sri Lanka (where they mostly failed) to try this hybrid form of producer organisation. Based on empirical evidence from across states, the article assesses their (FPCs’) physical and financial performance and impact and examines their market interface to improve farmer incomes by creating a producer agency. It dwells on their experiences with corporate players/buyers and their own efforts to create alternative market mechanisms to connect small farmers effectively with modern mainstream or alternative markets.

(Farmer) Producer Companies in India as new generation cooperatives: Case studies of performance and impact from West Bengal, India

“…This paper attempts to fills that gap. It is also crucial to examine the role and the potential of the PCs in enhancing farmer income or reducing production and marketing costs as there are questions on their potential role despite these entities supposedly being more innovative (Shah, 2016; Verma et al., 2019; Mourya & Mehta, 2021; Singh, 2022). This paper examines the impact of the PCs in the context of the West Bengal state of India with survey interviews of the member and the non‐member farmers across five PCs organized by two large and national level promoters, who work across Indian states with significant experience in this domain promoting dozens of such entities over the years, totalling 126 farmers—64 members and 62 non‐members—carried out in January 2020.…”

Does Land Transfer Enhance the Sustainable Livelihood of Rural Households? Evidence from China

“…Scholars from many nations and regions have shown increasing interest in the problems associated with farming livelihoods [30][31][32][33][34]. Livelihood capital can be classified as Agriculture 2023, 13, 1667 2 of 19 natural, physical, financial, social, and human [35].…”