Postrainy Season Sorghum Marketing in India: Constraints and Opportunities

Abstract

Indian agricultural marketing systems function relatively well although a number of critical issues impinge on their efficient functioning. For example, markets in the hinterland are generally thin, localized and segmented - smallholders dominate the agricultural system and this leads to low marketed surplus. The process of price discovery is often non-transparent; markets are ‘multi-level’ with many intermediaries, leading to high transaction/marketing costs, so, to sell their produce, farmers are dependent on intermediaries to avail of credit facilities in interlinked markets (credit/ input and output markets). Lack of grading and storage facilities and lack of information on market intelligence