A COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS OF MARKETING PATTERN OF MILK BY MEMBERS AND NON-MEMBERS OF DAIRY COOPERATIVE SOCIETIES IN KUMAON REGION OF UTTARAKHAND

摘要

The present study was carried out in U.S. Nagar and Almora districts of Kumaon region of Uttarakhand to ascertain the milk marketing patterns of members and non-members of Dairy Cooperative Societies (DCS), factors influencing cooperative membership and proportion of milk output sold. Logit model was employed to identify the significant factors influencing cooperative membership, while multivariate linear regression equation was fitted to identify the factors influencing proportion of output sold byfarmers. The findings of the study revealed that in the regions having cooperative network, DCS was the predominant marketing agency in both the hills and plains as it was patronized by the highest proportion of dairy farmers across all herd size categories. In the region outside the milk-route of dairy cooperative network, middlemen were the predominant agency in the plains while in the hills, milk producers in this region mostly sold to village consumers. Distance to market and non-farm income significantly influenced cooperative membership in both hills and plains. While the affect was positive in both the regions for the former variable, in case of the later, the effect was negative in the hills and positive in the plains. While landholding had positive influence on cooperative membership in the plains, it mostly had negative influence on intensity of market participation in both hills and plains. Milk production significantly and positively influenced marketed surplus more for member group than non-member group in both the regions, implying that member farmers are more favourably placed to increase their intensity of market participation with increase in scale of production. Price received for milk exerted negative influence on proportion of output sold, implying that households in the plains which received lower price for milk sold a greater proportion of milk produced so as to compensate for lower price with higher volume and thus get higher returns. In the hills however, price had positive influence on proportion of output sold, suggesting that higher prices provide enough incentives for the above categories of households to increase the proportion of milk output sold.