Agri-Marketing Partnership: An Indian Perspective

Abstract

The partnership extension involves any personnel in the private sector delivering physical or advisory services in the areas of agriculture and is viewed as assistance to public extension. Increased agricultural productivity and rapid industrial growth in the recent years have contributed to a significant reduction in poverty level, from 58% in 1973 to 17% in 2017. Despite the impressive growth and development, India is still home to the largest number of poor people of the world. With about 250 million below the poverty line, India accommodates about one-fifth of the world’s poor. About 25% children suffer from serious malnutrition. More than 50% of the rural pre-school children and rural pregnant women are anemic. Moving towards a vision of developed nation by 2022, Indian farmers still face a lot of complications of not getting a maximum return for their produce which results in outmigration and farmer suicides. Though much has been done in stimulating agricultural development in India by governments as well as by private organizations, still much more is needed in this sector to make farmer self-sufficient and resourceful. It is the call of the country to make agriculture as the most prioritized sector as other sectors are dependent on it. The present paper brings out some of the agri-business ventures by corporates and government into light and the success they have achieved in uplifting the Indian agricultural community. The paper also tries to highlight the gap in terms of agricultural inefficiencies. Although the present paper lures its findings from the Indian context; it is believed that the present study may have equal relevance to many of the developing countries that are facing similar problems in agricultural sustainability and diversification.