Abstract
The study gives insights on production performance of one of Bihar’s most important vegetable, the cauliflower. Compound annual growth in area, production and productivity of cauliflower were analyzed to investigate the expansion or shrinkage of the cauliflower in Samastipur district of Bihar as well as for the entire state. In this investigation, resource use efficiency of the respondent farmers were also calculated to know whether the farmers are operating technically, allocatively or cost effectively or not in production of cauliflower in the study area. Significant positive growth in area, production and productivity of cauliflower in Bihar was observed during the period of investigation. The growth in area, production and productivity of cauliflower exhibited almost similar trend in case of Samastipur district. The analysis of resource use efficiency of cauliflower production revealed that the mean level of technical, allocative and cost efficiencies of all the sample respondents were estimated at 0.67, 0.61 and 0.41 which implied that the cauliflower growers could decrease the current input by 33.00%, reduce the cost of production of cauliflower by 39.00% for which they would have to be more aware of relative input prices prevailing in the market, while deciding upon quantum of various inputs, and reduce the current cost of the produce by 59.00% to achieve a potential minimum cost of production relative to the efficient farmers given current level of output. In this way the efficiency scores suggest that there is a considerable scope for decreasing inputs and thereby reducing the cost of production in cauliflower cultivation in the study area. The study pointed out that the farmers in the study area were not properly aware about the package of practices of cultivation of cauliflower and under or over utilizing the resources of productivity causing gap in output of the crop. Proper farmer's field trials and awareness campaigns on improved practices and correct method of use of inputs need to be imparted which will ultimately benefit the producers.
Highlights
Cauliflower (Brassica oleracea) is an important vegetable of India
The mean level of technical efficiency (TE) of all the sample respondents taken together was estimated at 0.67, which implied that the cauliflower growers could be wiser to decrease the current input by 33.00% to produce the same amount of output using a given technology
From the ongoing discussion it may be inferred that significant positive growth in area, production and productivity of cauliflower in Bihar was observed during the period 2001-02 to 2015-16
Summary
Cauliflower (Brassica oleracea) is an important vegetable of India. Its cultivation is widely done in the sub-tropical parts of north India. In India, the area under cauliflower was 459 thousand hectares with a production of 8800 thousand tonnes and productivity of 19.17 tonnes/ha. India produces around 32.5% of the world’s total production of cauliflower. Cauliflower accounts for 5.06% of vegetable production of the country.[3] More than 20 million tonnes of cauliflower is produced annually worldwide and China and India are among the leading countries. China produces half of the world's yield which is huge revenue for the country. The cauliflower sector is accounted for over 75% of world production by Chinese and Indian cauliflower.[9, 10]
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