[ ] 30 The small farmers large field collective action model — making smallholder farmers profitable and sustainable Sampriti Baruah and Samarendu Mohanty International Potato Center Globally, there are 500 million small farmers with landholdings of two hectares or less out of 570 million farmers. Asia is no exception, where a majority of the farmers are small and marginal. In India alone, 86 per cent of its 146 million farmers are small and marginal. More strikingly, 70 million farmers have less than a half hectare of landholdings and another 30 million have between half and one hectare. In most cases, the lessthan-a-hectare landholding of small and marginal farmers is split into multiple patches. These 100 million marginal farmers with one hectare or less are at a huge disadvantage because they cannot afford to mechanize labour-intensive operations such as planting and harvesting and the high transaction costs in accessing both input and output markets. The inability of smallholders to access markets has led to subsistence rather than market-oriented production systems that could have led to diversified farming systems away from cereals to high-value products such as horticultural crops and livestock products. The geographically dispersed nature of smallholders also makes it difficult to reach them with the knowledge needed to improve efficiency in farming through technology adoption. The need for collective action to minimize the disadvantages faced by small and marginal farmers has been identified in several recent studies, including those of Gulati and Saini (2016), Chand (2017), and Singh (2018), as key approaches for improving their livelihoods. The small farmers large field (SFLF) model is an adapted version of the large field model (LFM) of collective action that was first introduced in Vietnam. Under the SFLF model, the participating farmers organize themselves into groups to purchase inputs; contract service providers for farm operations, including mechanical planting, harvesting, and other farm operations; and synchronize activities such as planting and harvesting that essentially converts their small landholdings into a large field. This approach enables them to cut costs via bulk purchases, improve efficiency by synchronizing operations, enhance quality by using certified seeds and improved production practices, and receive a premium price for their produce because of quality and volume. The SFLF collective action model The SFLF model has been piloted in rice-based cropping systems in the eastern Indian states of Odisha and Assam for rice and potato. Initially, it was piloted for rice in two locations (Taraboisasan and Khanizpur) in the state of Odisha. In the 2016/17 dry season, 54 farmers with 90 acres in the Taraboisasan village participated in the SFLF pilot by forming an eight-member committee to facilitate discussion and decision making. The group decided to cultivate a new flood-tolerant rice variety, BINA Dhan-11, that was just released in the state. The farmers selected this floodtolerant variety in the dry season because some of them had witnessed its good stem strength to withstand strong wind, which is a problem toward the end of the dry season. The committee members negotiated with a certified seed producer to make a joint purchase of seeds and collected money from the members based on their requirement. The first synchronized and collective activity undertaken by the group was nursery management. The participating farmers decided to prepare a nursery bed in three groups A few committee members, participating in the small farms large field action model, attending a meeting in the Taraboissan village. This village in eastern India pursued the collective action pilot in 2015/16 Image: Sampriti Baruah A Bet ter Wor ld
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