Prevailing practices and dimensions of contract wheat seed farming in Haryana state*

Assured incentive price for wheat seed motivates a farmer to enter into contract production with a company. The study is based on the primary as well as secondary data. Appropriate proportionate sample farmers (160) were drawn from the public and private seed agencies. Simple tabular and factor analysis techniques have been used. The Pepsi and the Tamil Nadu price fixation models have been employed for the study. Public agency contracted medium and large farmers whereas private agency contracted all farm-sizes. Nearly 30 per cent of small farmers were covered by the private agency under the Pepsi model. The wheat seed farmers of private agency received all inputs, production technology and extension services whereas the farmers of public agency were provided only the seeds. The net gains of medium and large wheat seed farmers of public agency were, respectively more by Rs 47.76 and Rs 48.21 per quintal over the corresponding grain farmers. The net gains of small, medium and large wheat seed farmers of the private agency were higher by Rs 54.10, Rs 27.99 and Rs 37.76 per quintal over the corresponding categories of grainfarmers, respectively. The net gain of small wheat seed farmers of the private agency has been reported as Rs 235.28 per quintal, which is the highest across different categories of farmers. The overall net gains of farmers of public agency under the Tamil Nadu model and of private agency under the Pepsi model are of Rs 185.44 and Rs 170.88 per quintal, respectively. The assured price has explained 37.68 per cent and 23.60 per cent of the variance in public and private seed agencies, respectively. The contract production procedural support provided to farmers of private and public agencies could explain 28.64 per cent and 6 per cent of the variance, respectively. Management of risks (10.15%), and physical infrastructure (8.27%) at farmers’ fields of public agency ranked almost equal in importance but trailed far behind in order of importance by farmers of private agency in making the choice.