Profitability and economic efficiency of input use in vegetable cultivation in Himachal Pradesh

The present study was conducted to examine the resource use efficiency of organic and inorganic vegetable crops in low hill zone of Himachal Pradesh. Simple random sampling technique was used to select a sample of 100 farmers. Cost incurred was higher for the cultivation of inorganic vegetable crops whereas, returns and output-input ratio was higher in organic cultivation. Cultivation of vegetable crops revealed that majority of inputs is being underutilized. Thus there is need for proper reallocation of the resources which will result in enhanced production. Major problems in the cultivation of vegetable crops were high wage rate, lack of organic certification, shortage of skilled labour and lack of technical knowledge.