Performance Evaluation of Farm Machine Banks in Bihar through Field, Economic and User's Response Analysis

Mechanization growth, technology adoption and net income of Farm Machine Banks were evaluated as performance indicator after three years of establishment. Mechanization growth in Dumara block of Sitamarhi district was maximum (30.56%) followed by Sakara of Muzaffarpur (26.57%), Benipur of Darbhanga (22.66%) and Madhwapur of Madhubani district (11.37%). Technology adoption was maximum in Farm Machine Bank, Madhubani (80%) followed by Sitamarhi (71.43%) and Darbhanga/Muzaffarpur (50.0%). Net income from operation of machine was maximum in Farm Machine Bank, Madhubani (Rs. 3, 01, 894.00) followed by Darbhanga (Rs. 2, 35, 123.00) and Sitamarhi (Rs. 1, 46, 679.00). Among various performance affecting parameters of Farm Machine Bank, ‘Poor involvement of farmers in machine operation’ was the prominent one with 90.3% scoring followed by ‘Non-provision of remuneration to office bearers of bank’ and ‘Essentiality of tractor with bank as power source’ with 87.3% and 80.5% scoring respectively. ‘Dispute among member farmers’ was reported to be the least dominant factor with 52.3% scoring followed by ‘Non-credit facility to users in custom hiring’ (62.5%) and ‘Poor maintenance of machine’ (63.8%). Besides above factors, ‘Need of trained machine operators’ as well as ‘Unavailability of machine to user's during peak period’ need to be addressed properly for better functioning of Farm Machine Banks.