The concept of National Agricultural Market has successfully expanded to over 417 markets covering 69 commodities across different categories of crops since its launch on 14 th April 2016. The concept has registered impressive success in terms of number of markets integrated with the common platform. The performance of the NAM at national level has been assessed in terms of number of markets integrated with the portal, trade taking place through the electronic platform and stakeholders registered using secondary information. The paper also attempts to capture the impact, if any, of the initiative on trade related aspects like prices though confined only to Rajasthan. The paper suggests that two-third of the markets are being contributed to the Scheme by just five states. There is need to enhance balanced spread of states under the Scheme and sensitize state on Model Act- 2017. In order to ensure inclusion of farmers, it is important to educate them on the benefits and procedure of eNAM and train them to prepare produce as per the requirements of such markets. A limited number of markets covered under the eNAM suggests for enhancing the coverage to generate sufficient price signals and attract trade. A more focused and scientific approach in terms of identification of market may also help in enhancing the impact. Paper also recommend adopting different means like education of stakeholders and creating sufficient support infrastructure to improve trade on e-portal and adopt a commodity- focused approach in place wide range of commodities to reap better benefit of the initiative. Positive influence on quality of prices suggests that Government need to have a long-term policy for development of such a concept having potential to resolve numerous problems prevailing in agricultural marketing.
