India produces thousands of agricultural products which are traded and transported within the States, across the States and exported outside India also. The following are the major constraints which the agricultural produce faces in transportation and marketing in India.
Marketing Challenges.
- State APMC Acts do not allow wholesale trade outside APMC mandis and in other states.
- Lack of private mandi infrastructure for trading Agri-produce.
- Lack of assaying facility for Agri-produce for electronic trading.
- 86% of small and marginal farmers have uneconomical lot for selling in mandis.
- A long chain of intermediaries who often work non-transparently leading to the situation where the producer receives only a small part of the value that the ultimate consumer pays.
Transportation Challenges:
- Non availability of timely railway wagon
- Costly rail and road transportation
- Lack of refrigerated vehicles for transportation of perishable Agri products.
- Lack of multi-modal logistics service provider
The three recent Acts passed by the Govt. of India reforming the agriculture sector will resolve most of the marketing challenges for agricultural produce in India. And to resolve the transportation challenge, the Ministry of Railway recently started Kisan Rail services between Deolali (in Maharashtra) and Danapur (Bihar) station and till now more than 100 Kisan Rails have been launched. These Kisan Rails help in transporting the agricultural produce of farmers to different parts of the country at a nominal cost.
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