Agribusiness Development Planning and Management

Agribusiness denotes the collective business activities that are performed from farm to the market. It covers the supply of agricultural inputs, the production and transformation of agricultural products and their distribution to final consumers. Itis one of the main generators of employment and income worldwide. Agribusiness is characterized by raw materials that are mostly perishable, variable in quality and not regularly available. The sector is subject to stringent regulatory controls on consumer safety, product quality and environmental protection. This book will introduce the readers to agricultural production and marketing as means to sustain the livelihoods. Agribusiness like agricultural marketing also covers the goods and services involved in moving an agricultural product from the producer to the consumer. Number of interrelated and interconnected activities are involved in doing this, such as production, growing and harvesting, grading, sorting, packing, transport, storage, agro-processing, distribution, advertising and sale. Marketing systems are dynamic; they are competitive and involve continuous change and improvement. Businesses that have lower costs, are more efficient, and can deliver quality products, are those that prosper. Those that have high costs, fail to adapt to changes in market demand and provide poorer quality is often forced out of business. Marketing and agribusiness has to be customer-oriented and has to provide the farmer, transporter, trader, processor, etc. with a profit. This requires those involved in marketing chains to understand buyer requirements, both in terms of product and business conditions. Agricultural opportunities are not restricted to farming only but various agro-based businesses, if chase even on a small-scale, can give much profit. …