Growth rate of cost of cultivation of soybean in Maharashtra States of India

Abstract

In India, many states grow soybean crops but Madhya Pradesh has the first position in soybean-growing states and it is also known as soya state. Maharashtra and Rajasthan state has a second and third position in India. Three states mainly Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, and Rajasthan accounted for almost 90% of the area under soybean cultivation. The area of soybean in Madhya Pradesh is 5.91million hectares with a total production of 4.91million tonnes with an average yield of 831million kg/ha. Maharashtra and Rajasthan cultivate soybean in an area of 3.70 and 1.20 million hectares with a production of 2.06 and 1.00 million tonnes with an average yield of 557 and 833 million kg/ ha respectively (Agricultural statistical at a glance 2016). Twenty years of data were collected for the study. The area, production, and productivity, cost of cultivation, gross income, factors affecting the profitability of soybean by collected from secondary data. Secondary data was collected from different publications. The analytical tools used were absolute change, relative change, simple growth rate, compound growth rate and coefficient of variation. The trend and growth rates of labour cost in Maharashtra showed that more than 50 per cent of the costs were incurred in human labor followed by machine labour and bullock labour. The bullock labour constituted about 18 per cent of the total labour costs and surprisingly much of labour cost in Maharashtra was not substituted by machine labour as observed in Madhya Pradesh. Decrease in the labour units for the cultivation of one hectare of land over the study period in Maharashtra shows that the marginal productivity of labour in soybean cultivation was increasing which was desirable. Increase in the labor cost was due to the increase in the unit labor rate. The bullock labour units were also showed a decreasing trend during the study period but the unit rate was increasing. Trend and growth of major inputs indicated that seed, fertilizers and manures, plant protection chemicals and irrigation were the major inputs used in Maharashtra. The highest growth rate was observed in plant protection chemicals which further depicted the increasing use of chemicals in pests and disease management or increasing incidence of pests and disease in soybean cultivation. Followed by, growth in irrigation charges also increased indicating that more investment for irrigation was observed in the soybean farmers of Maharashtra. The quantity of seed was decreasing but fertilizers and manures used per hectare were increasing during the study period in Maharashtra. Similar to Madhya Pradesh the unit rates for the inputs were increasing resulting in the increase in the input costs. Similar to Madhya Pradesh, the increase in the cost of seed incurred can be due to use of hybrid seed. The increase in the cost of manure can be due to farmers were not having sufficient own farm manure which makes the farmer to buy it from other sources. Therefore, there is an increase demand for manure in the market. Which pushes the demand for manure in the market and thereby pushes the price of manures. Trend and growth of fixed cost incurred in cultivation of soybean in Maharashtra showed that the total fixed cost per ha was increasing at a growth rate of 9.39. All the item of fixed cost had shown increasing except for land revenue cesses and taxes. Thus, the total cost of cultivation of Soybean in Maharashtra was increasing during the study period at a growth rate of 8.91 per cent. Similarly, the cost of producing per quintal of soybean increased at a growth rate of 8.61 per cent. Thus, all the cost components like labour costs, input costs and fixed costs were increasing during the study period making the farmer to invest more in the same piece of land.