Agricultural Marketing System in Bangladesh

Agricultural Marketing System in Bangladesh
—MUHAMMAD  FAZLUR  REHMAN*
Introduction
T
he nature of the Agriculture Marketing System in
Bangladesh is rather complex which stems from the
fact that there are innumerable small farmers spread all
over the country, where marketable surplus or marketed
quantity of the crops they grow is very small.  Collection
of these widely dispensed and small-marketed quantities is
bound to be costly and insufficient.  There are almost 13098
(DAM study 2000) small, medium amd big sized markets
in the country.  In Bangladesh except the activities performed
in connection with Public Food Distribution System (PFDS)
and agriculture price and marketing policy decision of the
Govt. the trade in all agricultural products is largely handed
by the private sector.  The general agricultural marketing
policy of the Government is to allow free play of the market
forces in determining the price and encourage larger
participation of the private sector.  One of the reasons for
the low price received by growers, particularly small farmers,
is lack of  market information, which also results inwide
inter-market price variation.  Improvement of agricultural
market information services is a necessary condition both
for domestic market efficiency and to integrate domestic
agricultural market with regional and international market
for sustainable development of agricultural sector as well as
to ensue country’s long run food security.
Agricultural Marketing Information System
2. The specific needs of the different market actors are :
Farmers—In short run: to reduce risk, negotiate with traders
and decide when or whether to harvest.  In the long run: to
plan production, diversify and assess storage viability.
Common sources of farmer market information are personal
visit to market, other farmers, traders, contractor, extension
workers, market information services and local offices of
Director General of Food.  Constraints of getting information
through personal visits include (i) time consuming and costly
unless going to market to sell produce; (ii) have a shortterm perspective; (iii) have information only about crops
they produce and markets they sell to and (iv) reluctance to
share information.  The traders do not see in their interest
to provide accurate information to farmers.  They only know
about the crops and markets with which they deal.  Extension
workers are rarely trained to assist farmers in marketing.
As such they are unable to help farmers with long-term
production planning and, anyway, receive no advice on this.
Need for bridging Information Gaps for Farmers
3. An information service, which collects and disseminates
regularly information on prices and supply conditions of
produce supply to a range of markets, analyses that
information to provide farmers with advice on seasonal
trends and identifies products that are in demand on domestic
and overseas markets is need of the time. Current service
capability of Market Information System is very poor due
to following limitations :
• Although much information is collected, little reaches
farmers;
• Information that does reach farmers is often out of
date and not something they are able to use in a
meaningful way;
• Even if reliable and up-to-date information provided
farmers have no way of knowing how to make use of it.
Possible Areas of Rapid Development
4. There is need for :
• Rapid review of existing marketing systems and of
t h e   n e e d s   o f   f a r m e r s   a n d   t r a d e r s   f o r   m a r k e t
information;
• Identification of pilot markets and other sites where
informa t ion  should be   col l e c t ed  for   immedi a t e
dissemination;
• Review of uses to which existing MIS data is put;
• Computer purchase;
• A market information service for Bangladesh, which
on a pilot scale accurately collects market prices and
speedily disseminate them to farmers and traders;
• Greater targeting of DAM’s analytical work to the
needs of farmers;
• Development of an export intelligence capacity in
DAM