Functional analysis of marketing of black gram in Lalitpur district of Uttar Pradesh

An investigation entitled “Functional Analysis of Marketing of Black gram in Lalitpur District of Uttar Pradesh” was conducted in Black gram grown in four different development blocks of Lalitpur district during the agricultural year 2014-15. Five villages from each block, 15 farmers from each village were selected randomly, so as to constitute an ultimate sample size of 300 farm households. Primary data were collected by the survey method by interviewing the black gram growers as well as different market functionaries involved through an especially structured and pre-tested schedule. In the study, the three types of marketing channels were identified to be followed by the black gram growers, the first one channel was the Producer - Village trader - Processor -Wholesaler -Retailer - Consumer, second channels was the Producer - Commission agent - Processor - Retailer - Consumer and third was the Producer - Processor - Consumer. Functional analysis of marketing of black gram reveals the highest traders’ profit in channel-III in terms of%age. But traders’ profit per quintal declined from channel-I to channel-III. This ranged from Rs. 2241.65/qtl. to Rs. 2523.46/qtl. In spite of the highest number of intermediaries in Channels-I, the highest marketing cost recorded in channel-II can be explained in terms of nonexistence of some functions in the former channel. The marketing efficiency was higher in marketing channel-III as compared to marketing channel-II and marketing Channel-I because of relatively low marketing cost and marketing margin in channel-III. These were estimated at 1.35, 1.46 and 1.78 in Channel-I, channel-II and channel-III respectively.