Measurement of Quality Attributes of Onion for Export: A Conjoint Analysis Approach

Onion is an important vegetable crop in India constituting 22.47 per cent of the total world production. It has accounted for 11.50 per cent of the total vegetable production in India during 2013–14. The share of onion exports to the world market is 7.64 per cent. The export demand for onion is influenced by various quality attributes vested in them. The main reason for the low exports is the lack of quality and non-availability of surplus for export. There is a need to systematically identify the relative importance of each of the quality attributes of export grade onions which influence demand in the world market. The present paper intends toidentify the most preferred attributes of onion for exports. In order to see which attributes are most important for export of onion, the conjoint analysis, a widely used technique in marketing research was used to determine the relative importance of each attribute. The results indicate that all the four attributes viz., bulb size, colour, shape and package size were significant. The group results of relative importance and individual utility revealed that the bulb size is the most important attribute for onion export. The quality attributes preferred by the traders of onion are 25–30 mm size, red colour and round shape with package size of 10 kg. At present Indian onions are exported to neighbouring markets. The quality attributes such as bulb size, colour, shape, and package size should be maintained in newly evolved varieties so that India can increase its presence in the international market. Hence maintenance of quality for international standards and developing forward and backward linkages in the production and marketing would possibly facilitate the onion exports from India with high price realization in the European countries.