Year: 2021 | Month: June | Volume 66 | Issue 2

Resource Productivity Analysis of Organic Turmeric Production in Surkhet District, Nepal

Suraj Acharya Pankaj Raj Dhital Bishal Bista Aashish Rashik Ghimire Sandeep Airee
DOI:10.46852/0424-2513.2.2021.2

Abstract:

This study was conducted in 2020 to determine the profitability and productivity of organic turmeric production in the Surkhet district of Mid-western Nepal. Face-to-face interviews were conducted with 60 farmers and two focus group discussions were held in four different communities. Turmeric is commonly utilized among Nepalese households in the preparation of curries and is considered one of Nepal’s top five major spice crops. Despite being one of the top five-spice crops, Nepal’s dependency on imported turmeric has been growing every year to meet domestic demand due to the gradual decline in domestic production. The simple descriptive and statistical tools including the Cobb-Douglas production function and benefit-cost analysis were used to analyze the result. The benefit-cost ratio was found to be 1.20, indicating that organic turmeric production was a low profitability sub-sector with a productivity of only 9.06 metric tons per hectare. The Cobb- Douglas production function showed that the cost on seed had a non-significant effect on gross returns and other costs like human labour cost, organic manure cost, ploughing cost, and other costs (agriculture equipment, thread, sack/doko, and rhizome treatment) were found statistically significant. Return to scale was calculated using the Cobb- Douglas production function and it was found to be 0.363, indicating that a 10% increase in the cost of production increases the rate of return by 3.63%, which is a diminishing rate of return. As a result, replacing human labour with agricultural machinery, lowering seed costs, and ensuring appropriate market prices are required to boost the productivity and profitability of organic turmeric production in the research area.

Highlights

  • The benefit-cost ratio was found to be (1.20), indicating that organic turmeric production was a low profitability subsector with a productivity of only 9.06 Metric tons per hectare.
  • The return to scale was found to be 0.363, indicating that a 10% increase in the cost of production increases the rate of return by 3.63%, which is a diminishing rate of return.
  • The highest cost was covered by seed rhizome (50%)
  • The majority of the turmeric farmers in the study area were still cultivating turmeric using traditional methods.
  • All of the producers employed organic input (seed, manure) that was readily available in the area, resulting in 100% organic turmeric.




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