International Journal of Agriculture Extension and Social Development

author(s)
Ruchira Shukla, Sharma S, Thakkar MG and Parmar GR

abstract
Vegetable growers face different types of risks like pests and diseases, weeds, poor quality of inputs, natural calamities, price fluctuations, inadequate demand forecasting, lack of infrastructural facilities, lack of capital, change in government policies, etc. These risks directly affect the yield and net income of farmers. To tackle these agriculture risks, individual farmers and governments adopt various management strategies to eliminate or partly reduce the effects of factors creating risk in agriculture. The study examined the sources of risk and management strategies among vegetable farmers in South Gujarat. Study indicated that pests and diseases, weather, damage by animals, erratic rainfall, yield variations, and labour unavailability and cost are considered major risk sources by vegetable farmers. Vegetable farmers mainly adopt risk mitigation and coping strategies such as pest and disease management, use of family labour, improved inputs, crop and enterprise diversification, and use of market information. However, farmers’ adoption of formal risk management approaches such as crop insurance, personal insurance, use of formal credit, and government schemes and subsidies were found to be low. Applying low-risk technologies, diversification, agricultural insurance, hedging, contracting, information support, effective use of natural resources and professional training can play an increasingly important role in the risk management of the farmers.