Status of Family Farming Systems in Balasore District of Odisha -A Case Study

Family farming constitutes that form of production, in which the ownership of the means of production and labor power co-exists in the same production unit, without a discrete division between capital and labor among family members. From a sociological perspective, family farming is associated with family values, such as solidarity, continuity and commitment; in economic terms, family farming is identified with specific entrepreneurial skills, business ownership and management. Hence to realize the full potential of family farmers in eradicating hunger and ensuring food security, an enabling policy environment is necessary. The state of Food and Agriculture 2014: “Innovation in family farming”, analysed family farms and their role in ensuring global food security, poverty reduction and environmental sustainability. Hence, the year 2014 was designated as the “International Year of Family Farming” at the 66th session of the United Nations General Assembly led by the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). NCEUS (2008) says that “some of the general challenges that confront small family farmers as agriculturalists are: absence of access to credit markets, smaller access to suitable extension services, restricting suitable decisions regarding cultivation practices, land and tenacy security, low level of formal education and skills, credit and indebtedness, globalization challenges and impact of climate changes. The topic entitled “Status of Family Farming Systems in Balasore district of Odisha” was conducted in the Balasore district of Odisha. This district was selected as Family farming practices was confined to this area under favourable agro- climatic condition. The results of this research study revealed that the acceptance of family farming was high in coastal blocks of the study area as compared to distant blocks of the district. There are six different family farming patterns were found in the study area. The majority of the farmers belonged to medium-type farmers and most of those were having dairy enterprises. Similarly, most of the farmers were having a number of domestic animals of their own and the majority of them practiced pisciculture as their secondary enterprise as a significant bulk of the farmers had a pond of their own and crop cultivation as their primary enterprise. Similarly, plantation and goatery had emerged as the majorly followed enterprises in the study area. This study definitely unfolded some significant areas in the field of status of family farming system which can be critically analysed and suitably streamlined by the scientists, planner and policymakers and also provides vital information about different primary and secondary agriculture & allied enterprises of the study area. It can be concluded from the study that, Status of family farming is quite stable and satisfactory in the study area and it can be added that, encouraging more families to take part in family farming has many benefits.