Agribusiness Management

Agribusiness Managementt

Faculty :

	Sanjeev Kapoor

	Jabir Ali

	Kriti Bardhan Gupta

	Maya Kant Awasthi

	Sushil Kumar

	Sourindra Bhattacharjee

Agriculture, being the main sector of Indian economy, supports more than three-fourth of the total population and contributes nearly one-fourth to the total Gross Domestic Product of the Country. During last five decades, even through agriculture sector has grown substantially, it has not been able to sustain its growth mainly due to lack of proper management of resources like land, water and manpower. From the very beginning, IIML's vision was to prepare young dynamic managers and entrepreneurs for improving the performance of both corporate and the non-corporate sector like agriculture. With a view to exclusively fulfil this commitment, the Institute established the Centre for Food and Agribusiness Management (CFAM) in 1998 with the objectives to:

preparing young dynamic graduates and entrepreneurs for efficient management of farm sector.

imparting high level practical training supported by field-based research, through effective linkages between national & international academic institutions as well as organizations and agencies; and

offer consultancy to national & international organizations in the field of agriculture and rural management.

VISION

CFAM has a vision to create an ethos of creativity and innovation for enhancing the quality of management in the farm and agribusiness sector so that the whole food chain becomes globally competitive. This will lead to the process of sustained economic growth and agrarian transformation.

MISSION

CFAM works with a mission to bring rural prosperity for improving the quality of rural life through effective and efficient management of productive resources. The guiding philosophy is broad-based agricultural growth that leads to sustainable economic development.

GOAL

CFAM has both short-term and long-term goal. It plans to grow as a centre of excellence, capable of generating knowledge for efficient management of farm sector. The ultimate goal is overall personality development with competence, confidence, courage, culture, communicative ability and creative fervour for influencing people for their sustainable development with a motto of 'Even best can be improved'.

CURRENT ACTIVITIES

Current activities of CFAM are Teaching, Research, Training and Consultancy.

Teaching

An innovative Post-Graduate Programme in Agri-business Management (ABM) of two years duration with the special focus on producing entrepreneurs and entrapreneurs in agribusiness with an international orientation has commenced since 2004-2005. This course will help produce techno-managers for the promotion of agribusiness based enterprises such as:

Production and marketing of farm inputs like seeds, fertilizers, pesticides, farm machinery and equipments, livestock feed, irrigation, and credit;

Production, procurement, processing, manufacturing, and marketing of agro-based outputs, products, and brands;

Providing services to agriculture and agribusiness such as, export and import, rural banking, financing agro-based products, insurance, logistics, water management, research and development and rural energy.

Research

Currently the centre is contemplating data based research on the issues like income distribution, gender issues, participatory monitoring & evaluation, institutional reforms and on some of the agricultural policies frame work for improving the effectiveness of the project interventions.

Training

The Centre conducts a wide variety of short-duration training programmes both for government and non-government personnels bringing sustainable agriculture system in the country.

Consultancy

The Centre has taken up a number of consultancy assignments related to :

	U.P. Diversified Agriculture Support Project (DSAP-UP).
	Diversified Agriculture Support Project - Uttaranchal - DSAP-UP.
	National Agriculture Technology Project (NATP).
	Integrated Watershed Development Project (IWDP-II) in Jammu and Kashmir.
	Assam Rural Infrastructure and Agriculture Support Project (ASIASP) in Assam.

Preparation of database for manpower and financial resources devoted to R&D in higher education sector of the Country. The project has been assisted by Department of Science & Technology, Govt. of India.

FUTURE STRATEGY

Traditional agriculture has always been a way of life and subsistence-oriented. Yet, with the passage of time and evolution of the new farming system, it has become more commercialized. There is a strong need now to shift out traditional production-oriented approach to market-oriented approach and from Deficit Management to Surplus-Management. Besides, the economic policies of Liberalization and Globalization have accelerated the pace of transformation of agriculture into a commercial and market-driven enterprise. These changes have opened new opportunities for export and processing of agricultural products. These developments have brought about new challenges in particular that of growing requirement of techno-managerial skills in the agriculture sector.

The agenda for future direction is guided by the implication of these changing scenarios for achieving the goal of Sustainable Agricultural and Rural Development leading to rural prosperity in India.