Home About IUP Magazines Journals Books Amicus Archives
     
A Guided Tour | Recommend | Links | Subscriber Services | Feedback | Subscribe Online
 
The IUP Journal of Agricultural Economics :
Perceptions on the Quality and Perceived Constraints in the Accessibility of Livestock Services in Tamil Nadu (South India)
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
:
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

This paper on the farmers' perception on livestock services provision in Tamil Nadu reveals that the home services rendered by veterinarians as the best one, followed by private veterinary clinics, home services by Para-veterinarians, public veterinary centaers and co-operative veterinary centers. This paper exhibits the major constraints in availing the public livestock services by the farmers such as long distance to the public veterinary center, longer waiting time to attend the case by the service provider and inadequacy of drugs in the centers. Further, it concludes that high service charges, expensive drug/semen and delay in availing appointment of service provider are the main problems of the private livestock services, hence, there is a need to provide improved services to the farmers through regulatory framework.

Livestock has been an integral part of the Indian rural economy. Being interlinked with the religious, social and cultural ethos of the people, their importance transcends the study of economics. Besides complementing and supplementing crop agriculture, animal agriculture has often been providing succor and sense of security to farmers even during the failure of crop agriculture due to vagaries of monsoons. Livestock is an indispensable tool of income to millions of poor households across the country, besides being a major source of protein and supplementary nutrition, draught power, fertilizer, fuel and a source of wealth (Ravishankar and Birthal, 1999).

Livestock plays a crucial role in the national economy, especially for the rural vulnerable landless and women folk, employing over 11 million in principal and 8 million in subsidiary status, which is about 5% of the total workforce in the country. The livestock sector contributes around 6.29% to GDP with the value of Rs. 1,64,509 cr at current prices during the year 2003-04. Contribution of livestock sub-sector to agricultural GDP has shown an impressive growth in the last two decades—from less than 15% in the late 1970s to over 30% in 2003-04, with the value of livestock output growing by 6% per annum and the livestock industry contributing a major share to this growth. Due to sustained economic growth and rising income, the demand for livestock products has became income elastic. It is also proved that the value of income elasticity was almost unity even in rural areas according to some estimates (GOI, 2006; FAO, 2005).

 
 
 

Perceptions on the Quality and Perceived Constraints in the Accessibility of Livestock Services in Tamil Nadu (South India),livestock, veterinary, service, agriculture, private, economy, country, constraints, cooperative, crucial, cultural, distance, drugsemen, economic, elastic, employing, estimates, expensive, appointment, framework, households, Indian, inadequacy, indispensable, landless, Livestock, Besides, national, Paraveterinarians