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Research Proposal on
PRICE DISCRIMINATION OF RICE: FACTORS CAUSED TO DEPRIVATION OF FARMERS FROM FAIR PRICE
Agricultural Marketing [Course No: 421]
Md. Faruk Hossain Roll No – 35 Section – A BBA 12th Batch (Marketing) University of Dhaka
Date of Submission: June 01, 2010
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
S. No.
Topic
Page No.
1.
The Statement of the Problem
03
2.
Aims and Objectives
03
3.
Key Research Questions
04
4.
Literature Review
04
5.
Conceptual Framework
05
6.
Development of Hypotheses
06
7.
Research Methodology
06
8.
Sampling Technique
07
9.
Research Implication
07
Research Program Timeline
07
Bibliography
08
10.
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PRICE DISCRIMINATION OF RICE: FACTORS CAUSED TO DEPRIVATION OF FARMERS FROM FAIR PRICE
Abstract This study is concerned with the price discrimination of the Rice Farmers who don’t get fair price of their cultivated rice despite bumper production in each year. Several factors and causes might be responsible for that. This study will be tried to seek these factors and variable by conducting mainly three steps of research with two types of research design: Exploratory and Descriptive. Both focus group and Agricultural Experts will be included in research discussions and fifty samples will be taken from the relative population of farmers. After collection and analysis of data, conclusion will be made by qualitative research that results a significant decision and implication of both in General and Managerial Implication.
1.0 The Statement of the Problem
Rice is the main staple food of Bangladesh. It also holds the greater percentage of food crops cultivated here, because lots of farmers live on Rice Cultivation. Despite large amount of production, Bangladesh has still to import Rice to balance the consumption (IRIN News, 2008). Due to the worldwide shortage of Rice Production (Bangladesh News, 2008), Rice price has been soaring frequently, for which import price has been increasing day by day. On the other hand, though the full swing with bumper productions of Rice in every year, farmers are still deprived of fair price (The Daily Star, 2010). So it is needed to seek for the factors and causes for what farmers are not obtaining their deserved price of the Rice Paddy, where at the same time consumers have to purchase Rice at a soared price. This study will seek to find out the factors caused to deprivation of farmers from fair price of Rice despite the bumper production of rice every year.
2.0 Aims and Objectives
The main broad objective or Aim of this study is:
To seek out the causes and factors of depriving the farmers from obtaining fair price of Rice after the cultivation by comprehensive review of literature and empirical studies.
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And the specific objectives are: 1) To seek for the factors of price deprivation 2) To evaluate these factors 3) To explain the factors and causes 4) To suggest some general remedies to ensure the fair price of Rice to the farmers
3.0 Key Research Questions
1) What are the primary causes or factors affecting farmers to ascertain the fair price of Rice? 2) How these factors can be evaluated? How many of these factors can be manipulated and mitigated by adopting necessary action programs and remedies? 4.0 Literature Review
Though farmers conduct bountiful rice production, the biggest problem of farmers remains to be solved, which is poverty (Xuan, 1995). Xuan (1995) also depicted that the main cause of that poverty of farmers is their limited capability in managing their resources for sustainable development. In another study, irrigation inefficiency is mentioned a cause to low price of Rice paddy (Kan, 2004). Due to irrigation inefficiency, farmers get the crops harvested in inadequately dried form that offer them low price from the middlemen (Priyo News, 2010). Mondal (2010) opined that middlemen and millers are the most influential key factors who collected rice paddies from farmers with a very low price. He also stated that there is the need for devising the procurement mechanism in such a way that the growers or farmers, not the middlemen or the rice-millers, are benefitted most from the government procurement drive. The farmers must get the right price of their produce so that they feel encouraged to grow more food to feed the nation. Majumder et al. (2009) mentioned predominant tenancy arrangement as the factor of not getting fair price of rice because the crop share tenants were unable to invest on modern farm inputs. Regional Imbalance and Information gap can be big factors or causes for farmers not to have expected price of the crops (Ullah, 2008). Ullah (2008) also depicted preservation crisis, Increase of food production, and Transportation as the basic causes of selling Rice with very low price. In another study, it was suspected that food production and distribution are centrally controlled by giant, globe-spanning business enterprises (Barker, 2007), that might be the cause not to getting fair price for the farmers. In an IMF country report on Bangladesh, Inadequate marketing infrastructure of agro-based products and farmers’ getting of inappropriate price of their products are considers two of the major impediments to poverty 4|Page
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reduction in several districts in Bangladesh (IMF, 2004). Regarding and considering all of these facts, this study will be conducted to find out the causes of deprived pricing to the farmers and the ways of mitigating these effects.
5.0 Conceptual Framework
This research is concerned with the variables and factors that cause for failing to ensure fair price to the Rice farmers who cultivates bumper rice every period. Seeking out these factors, Middlemen & Millers effects, Information gap, Knowledge of Price, Preservation crisis of rice, Imperfect transportation & distribution facility, and inadequate marketing infrastructure will be used as main treatments or independent variables which will be tried to be manipulated (Xuan, 1995; Barker, 2007; Ullah, 2008; Mondal, 2010). Here, highly increase in food production and Rush money expectation of farmers (IMF, 2004; Ullah, 2008) will be used as Extraneous Variables that might affect the treatments to perfectly create the effect on dependent variable. Here, dependent variables should be the outcome of the effect on Farmer Price, as well as the evaluation and control of the treatments on the Farmer Price. The Model can be sketched as below:
Extraneous Variables Treatments (Independent Variables)
1. Middlemen & Millers effects 2. Information gap
1. Highly increase in food production 2. Rush money expectation of farmers
Farmers’ having of Fair Rice Price
3. Knowledge of Price 4. Preservation crisis of rice 5. Imperfect transportation & distribution facility
Dependent Variable (Result Outcome)
Evaluation and Control Possibility of Each Treatment
6. Inadequate Marketing infrastructure
Figure-1: Schematic Diagram of Conceptual Framework / Model
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6.0 Development of Hypotheses H1: Due to the Middlemen and Millers, farmers don’t get fair price of Rice despite bumper
production. H2: Information gap is one of the main factors of fair Price deprivation. H3: Farmers don’t have enough knowledge of current price that lead them to sell their Rice
with very low price. H4: Considering Preservation crisis, farmers sell Rice with a minimal price. H5: Due to Imperfect transportation and distribution facility, farmers don’t sell their crops
perfectly with fair price. H6: Inadequate Marketing Infrastructure also causes to hinder to ensure the fair price to the
farmers. H7 : Treatments can be perfectly evaluated and controlled that drive the fair price conformity
to the Rice farmers. H8: Highly increase in food production and Rush money expectation of farmers can affect
the treatments to make effect on the farmers’ fair price having. 7.0 Research Methodology
Both Exploratory and Descriptive Research will be conducted in this study. In Exploratory Research design, both focus group and Agricultural Experts will be contacted. After the discussion with focus group and interview with experts, descriptive research will be designed. Here, rigorous questionnaire will be designed to conduct a survey on farmers. Randomly around fifty samples will be drawn from the farmers. Descriptive research will be both quantitative and qualitative. In quantitative, data collection and analysis will be conducted, and decision making will be based on qualitative research. Research will be conducted in one district to conduct survey on fifty samples of farmers. The Respondents then will consist of Farmers, Agricultural Experts, and Focus Group. Farmers’ price attitude toward the treatments as well as the questionnaire would be used as the Instruments. Data collection will be conducted in three steps: 1) Discussion with focus group, 2) Interview with
Agricultural Experts, and 3) Survey on farmers. Measures of Central tendency, Dispersion, ANOVA, Regression analysis, and Multivariate Analysis would be applied as Statistical 6|Page
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Techniques. Finally ‘evaluation and control possibility’ of the treatments will be concluded
with qualitative research design. 8.0 Sampling Technique
The Population is defined mainly as the farmers who are the sufferers of Rice price deprivation. Among this population, randomly fifty samples will be taken to conduct survey. Based on these sample size, quantitative and qualitative research will be conducted to draw the conclusion. 9.0 Research Implication
As a part of General Implication, this study will help the future study conducted based on or relevant to this issue as references. On the other hand, as a part of Service or Managerial Implication, this study will help the country policymakers to design the policies in
agricultural sectors, as well as help to reduce the poverty line. 10.0 Research Program Timeline
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P.T.O.
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Literature Review Finding Research Proposal Preparation Research Design Preparation Data Collection Data analysis Write up Editing and submission
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Bibliography
1. Barker, Debbie, (2007). ‘The Rise and Predictable Fall of Globalized Industrial Agriculture’, International Forum on Globalization (IFG), San Francisco, USA. 2. Bangladesh News Online, (2008), ‘ Worldwide shortage of rice shoots prices soaring’, Available from: http://www.independentbangladesh.com/200802212190/business/worldwide-shortage-of-rice-shoots-pricessoaring.html [Accessed May 22, 2010] 3. Hossain, Nazmul, 2000. Ecommerce in Bangladesh: Status, Potential, and Constraints, Available from: http://www.jobsproject.org/content/publication/ECommerce_in_Bangladesh_status.pdf [Accessed April 22, 2010] 4. IMF, (2004), ‘Bangladesh: Preparation of Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper’, IMF Country Report No. 04/279, 2004. 5. IRIN, (2008), BANGLADESH: ‘Rice price stabilises but shortages continue’, Available from: http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/IRIN/d08bdc8ed113a42989155893cca 08dec.htm [Accessed May 22, 2010] 6. Kan, Chun, E., (2004). ‘Improving Irrigation Management Systems for Rice Farming’, Available from: http://www.agnet.org/library/eb/547/eb547.pdf [Accessed May 23, 2010] 7. Majumder, M. K., Mozumdar, L., Roy, P. C., (2009 ). ‘Productivity and Resource Use Efficiency of Boro Rice Production ‘, Journal of Bangladesh Agricultural University, 7(2): 247-252, 2009. 8. Mondal, M., Abdul, Latif, (2010), ‘The middlemen rule the roost’, The Daily Star, May 6, 2010. 9. Priyo News (2010), ‘Boro harvest continues in full swing with bumper productions’, Available from: http://priyo.com/news/2010/may/21/40786.html [Accessed May 23, 2010] 10. The Daily Star, (2010), ‘Boro harvest continues in full swing with bumper productions’, Available from: http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/newsdetails.php?nid=137151 [Accessed May 22, 2010] 11. Ullah, Mr., Shahid, (2008). ‘Budget 2008-09: Agriculture, Food security and Public Service Sectors’, Paper Presented at CIRDAP, Dhaka, Bangladesh, April 20, 2008.
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12. Xuan, Vo-Tong, (1995). ‘Priorities for Rice Research - A View from Developing Countries’, paper presented at the Festival of Rice, Montpellier, France, Oct. 6-8, 1995.
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