Mango

Marketing

Distribution and Marketing

Introduction

Distribution is an extremely important phase in the marketing of mangoes.
The fruit after harvest has to pass through several agencies before reaching the consumer.
Producers do not generally undertake wholesale distribution of mangoes, as it is a common practice to lease out the orchards to pre-harvest contractors-who take care of watch and ward of the crop till maturity and then dispose of the produce as it suits them.
Only a small number of producers have direct dealings with the consumers or sell their produce through the commission agents.
There is a wide disparity in the prices of standing crop from place to place and even from year to year in the same area and from one orchard to another.
It is mainly due to the irregular bearing habit of mango trees.
Income from mango growing, therefore is very uncertain.
Usually contractors are financed by commission agents or wholesalers.
Thus the contractor is obliged to sell the produce through the leading commission agents.
Sometimes they dispose of the produce directly to wholesalers or retailers.
Commission agents, generally known as arhatiyas or dalals also include the forwarding agents who own the responsibility of proper packaging and transit.
They are the most important link in the marketing of mango and about two-thirds of the total market is controlled by these agents.
They are located in both the assembling (producing) and consuming centers.
At some places they not only sell fruits on commission basis but also transact wholesale business on their own account.
In big cities like Bombay, Calcutta, Lucknow and Delhi, there are separate commission agents for imported fruits and for local produce.
Most of the raw material to processing industries is supplied by the commission agents.
Very few co-operative societies exist at present in mango-producing areas.
In Uttar Pradesh there is no such society, although it is the premier mango-producing state.
There are a few societies in Gujarat which purchase the farmers' produce and transport it to distant markets to the commission agents.
The marketing of mango in Bulsar district of Gujarat is mostly done by co-operative societies, of which all the growers including commission agents are members.
These advance about 50% of the cost to the grower and the balance is cleared immediately after his produce is sold.
The mango sale societies at Vengurla, Malva and Deogarh in Ratnagiri district of Maharashtra are functioning well.
They collect the produce of their members and send it for sale to the commission agents at Bombay.
The Government of Uttar Pradesh proposed to create Fruit Growers' Associations in all the districts under their Horticultural Development Scheme.
In Tamil Nadu, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh there are 10 co-operative societies for marketing of mangoes.
In Bihar there are only 2 fruit growers associations.
In Karnataka there is only the Mysore Horticulture Society to help the marketing of fruits.
The retail distribution is done by growers, contractors, commission agents and wholesalers, stall-holders, shop-keepers and hawkers in varying degrees.
A fairly large proportion of the profit is taken away by the intermediaries.
To ensure better returns to the growers, and fruits at cheaper rates to the consumers, formation of fruit grower's co-operative sale societies deserves encouragement.

Main Distribution and Marketing Centres

Mangoes grown in different parts of the country are transported to the big cities for marketing.
The fruits produced in Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Tamil Nadu find markets in Nagpur, Mumbai, Calcutta and vice versa.
As per survey made by the Directorate of Marketing and Inspection (1965), the important wholesale mango markets in India are Calcutta, Delhi,Mumbai, Chennai, Ahmedabad, Pune and Nagpur.
Mangoes for these big markets are usually collected at the central places in all the mango-growing areas, e.g., in Uttar Pradesh, Lucknow and Varanasi; in Gujarat, Gandevi, Gadat and Amalsar talukas of Bulsar district; and in Maharashtra, Ratnagiri and Vengurla.
The survey has also shown that Delhi and Bombay are the most important markets for dispatch of mangoes.
At Delhi all the mangoes are assembled at Sabzimandi, Ashoka market, and at Bombay at Crawford and Byculla markets for distribution.

Price Structure

No official records or publication showing the prices of mangoes are available.
The growers seldom, if ever, maintain any record of their transactions and the same is the case with pre-harvest contractors.
The commission agents and wholesale merchants do keep accounts of their transactions, but little information is available from their books regarding the quality and the variety sole by them.
For a proper appraisal of prices, it is essential that these should relateto the standard quality and variety in each case.
Mango prices vary a great deal from year to year, depending upon each year's total production and various other factors like prevailing prices, demand, transport and marketing facilities.
Wholesale prices of mangoes also vary considerably, depending upon the supply and demand of particular varieties, periods of availability, weather conditions, transport facilities, variety, quality, etc.
Daily arrivals have also a direct bearing on the prices.
Thus the fluctuations in prices are of an irregular pattern.
Ordinarily, however, the prices are high at the commencement of the season, declining gradually as the supplies increase.
Later on, when the arrivals decrease, they tend to recovery and reach a high level again before the close of the season.
The following table shows month and variety-wise wholesale prices of mangoes at different assembling centres, as available from commission agents and marketing authorities.
There is no uniform pattern for price quotations.
The unit of sale, both in wholesale and retain trade, varies from place to place causing great confusion for comparing prices in different markets.
It is therefore desirable to standardize the unit of sale in different areas. Peak Mango Marketing Seasons for Various countries

Peak Mango Marketing Seasons for Various countries

Countries	Peak mango marketing season
Brazil	Year round
Burkina Faso	March-July
Columbia	Year round
Costa Rica	March-September
Gambia	May-July
Guatemala	March-July
Guinea	May-August
Ecuador	November-February
Egypt	August-October
India	April-June
Indonesia	May-August
Israel	July-December
Cote d Ivories	March-July
Jamaica	May-October
Kenya	Year round
Madagascar	November-December
Mali	March-July
Mexico	April-December
Nicaragua	April-July
Pakistan	June-August
Peru	September-May
Puerto Rico	March-November
Senegal	May-July
South Africa	January-May
Spain	September-December
Sudan	June-August
Swaziland	January-March
USA	June-October
Venezuela	Year round
Zambia	January-March
Zimbabwe	November-April

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Andhra Pradesh

Mango

About Mango

History
Morphology

Mango Management

Services Overview

The key services offered by Ikisan are:

System study, design and development of IT enabled solutions and services for the agri sector.

Execution of rural IT enabled projects on BOT/BOOT/Turnkey basis.

Development, Customization and Deployment of Ikisan's IPR protected software applications.

Providing support services and best management practices for augmenting the marketing development efforts of the groups agricultural input companies (NFCL and NACL).

Development and Dissemination of best practice and information though a unique multi lingual knowledge website for the agri sector.

Some of the key customers/partners that benefit significantly from our work include are Electronics Corporation of India Ltd, State Agricultural Marketing Boards, Central Research Institute for Dryland Agriculture, Tamil Nadu, Centre for Development of Advanced Computing, Motorola Mobility (GOOGLE) etc.

As highlighted earlier Ikisan provides significant support to the market development and marketing efforts of NFCL and NACL by providing best practices and information across the agricultural input value chain - weather, soil, seeds, fertilizers, water, pesticides, output prices etc. that have enabled the companies to develop deep customer relationships and in turn enable them to grow above market growth rates. Recently example in fertilizers includes the development of Customized Fertilizer Grades (for NFCL across India that are crop and location specific have not only reduced the current consumption of fertilizers of farmers but have significantly enhanced crop yields and farmer incomes) that are expected to add significant revenues to the company.

Currently, agriculture value chain is driven by technical expertise. However, there is a lack of adequate Management knowledge and skills amongst the professionals. Therefore, Ikisan and XLRI, Jamshedpur have jointly developed an Agri Business Management Program for Agri-professionals and students. Ikisan provides the domain expertise while XLRI provides pedagogy. This program is a combination of virtual learning and campus based module at XLRI, Jamshedpur. This program has been highly appreciated.

Intellectual Property Rights for many software applications such as Field Manager, Vyapar, Mandi, Quick Solutions Systems, Management Time Table, Agri Information System and Agrecommerz belong to Ikisan. A significant recent development in this area is the introduction of Weather Based Crop Insurance. This entails setting up of Automatic Weather Stations, which provide dynamic village-level data essential for settlement of weather based insurance claims.