How do u sell your produce at a price you want?
As soon as we get the harvest, the brokers swarm around us. Each of them wants a major share of the produce. But they want to pay us less. They try to fix a price. We generally don't like that price. We do our calculations and we can not come down to a price which is less than the (invested+investment needed). We bargain and get closer to what we want. We sell it off. Some of us keep a portion of produce which will be sold after another season. The older rice fetches more price. Rich farmers do use facilities of Warehouses because they can afford it.
Why do not you go to the market yard?
We can sell only at government fixed rates in the market yards. The quality of rice produced does not matter in the pricing. Over that, we need to take the produce to the market yard and wait till it is sold. We also need to pay bills on each bag sold. Why go to the market yard when we can make a deal with the broker. After hard work on the farm, we do not have the energy to transport and sell our produce.
Don't brokers trouble you?
Why will not they trouble us? They take our produce first. Then they pay us after making us wait. And you know that we prepare for our next crop. We need money for seeds and pesticides. So we take a loan from money lender. The interest rate is around 18% to 40%. After fighting for a better price, we lose the money in the form of interest. It is a double loss for us. This is the big problem with brokers.
I buy from you. Why don't you sell it to the other customers?
You buy because it is from your farm and you know us. Why will some other guy take the pain of coming to our village and buy? There is no platform for us to sell. Most of the customers buy retail rather than wholesale.
If you have a better platform, a better price, will you sell it?
Why not! You are educated. You should help us. These days many things are sold online. Can we do that?
Ended there!
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