Age-old traditional weekly markets, which have been in existence even in 21st Centaury, are the exchanges centers of goods and services, which flow from rural to urban, urban to rural and within the rural areas. The net work system of the market is very large and popular, the partners of this system are producers of agricultural products, traders of various manufacturers, artisans, service providers, wholesale buyers facilitating agencies like transport organizations, catering agencies, monitoring and supervising organizations, local self government and other agencies. In Assam, more than 80% of population living in rural areas sells their products in nearly weekly markets and therefore weekly market plays a major role in Assam economy.
Due to the structure reforms initiated during the last decade, the market environmental has become very dynamic and there is a strong needs to analyse weekly market network system’s Strength, Weaknesses, Threats and Opportunities at this crucial juncture. Keeping these points in mind, this study has been undertaken to understand to what extent weekly markets are able
· To fulfill the changing needs of the people besides age old traditional needs
· To study the season wise trends in type and nature of the products as services offered, price charged sales turnover.
· To study the effectiveness of marketing practices and methods adopted biweekly market system.
· To identify and compare strengths weaknesses threats and opportunities of weekly markets between tribal and non-tribal areas.
· To design and develop suitable methods, approaches, strategies, to be adopted for reengineering and sustaining the age-old traditional weekly market.
For this study, the data is collected from primary and secondary sources. The secondary data on government bid and settlements of market, tax rates on products, shop wise revenue for the weekly market, investment for market development by DRDAs, Zile Parishad, number of market, average price list of products in various markets, population demography, production and distribution among the States, number of institution and nature for support for entrepreneur, paper research on market system have been collected from various institutions, like tribal research institute, Amiyakar Das institute of Social Change, Guwahati, Library of Guwahati University, Tejpur University.
With regard to primary data clusters of weekly market located in middle Assam have been studied. The data is collected by using interview schedule, from all market partners like; Mahaldars, sellers, buyers, middle men, facilitators, academic, NGOs leaders and local people.
The results of the study are given from Chapter 2 to Chapter 9. Chapter 2 highlights profile of 14 markets studied for the research purpose. For this 14 markets information have been collected on age, area, major product divisions, village, ethnic group, sellers, buyers, facilitators, middlemen. Availability of products and services throughout the year, peak seasons, and off seasons are collected. Information on infrastructure facilities, socio economic aspects have also been collected.On the basis of the information it has been observed that out of nine markets three markets (Dhekiajuli, Lokhra and Mission Chariali) are of cosmopolitan nature, two markets (Jammugura and Sootia) are Assamese culture and one each by Nepali (Gomiri)and Tea tribe (Borjuli and two (Panchmili and Rupohi ) are dominated by Muslim community. Whereas out of five tribal markets, two markets (Kokila and Rowanmukh) are plain tribes and one each dominated by Boro and Mishing. The remaining three markets (Dhamsiri Langsoliete and Manga) are located in the hill areas of Karbi and Anglong Autonomous Council. They are dominated by Karbi and Damasa. All the ethnic groups are involved as market partners. Relating to middlemen, it is observed that mostly Bengali and Muslims people take up middlemen activities. It is observed that not only the products are brought from and send to long distances but also various partners like sellers and buyers, facilitators and middlemen are coming from very long distances to participate in the market as the active partner. Market management is governed and maintained by democratic organizations,. Most of the markets are governed by Gaon Pancyat, Block Zila Parishad and few are monitored by Tea Garden, Municipalities and private individuals and autonomous councils. Through these markets, employment to several people is created and traditional transport system besides motor vehicles is used in the market. Several social culture and economic activities are taken up in the market. It is also concluded that tribal markets are also smaller in terms of sales turnover, tax rate, amount of tax collection, number of partners etc.
To know up to what extent weekly market are able to fulfill the changing needs of the people besides age old traditional needs, the information on culture driven needs of the various ethnic groups are collected and the information is tabulated and presented in table 3.1 of the Chapter 3.
The data collected on various variables like population demography, production and distribution of products, institutional network for marketing system, yearly average prices of the products in various markets, revenue from weekly market, investment for weekly market, tax rate fixed, and actual tax rate charged by market management authority, sales turnover of products and services, average investment made by sellers and their respective profits, average number of partners participated in the market have been collected is presented in tables 4.1 to 4.17. Through these tables the observations made are:
(i) Most of the men and women are literate
(ii) Prices of the product sold in the market during 1997-98 to 2002-03.are more or less same in different markets in the same area
(iii) In the markets, good number of prospective bidder is competing for market bids and in the same market settlement value is significantly higher than bid values.
(iv) In tribal and Nepali dominated market tax collection per day is very low where in non-tribal markets tax collection is significantly high.
(v) In all non-tribal markets except Gomiri sales turnover per day is more than one lakh and in tribal market it is less than one lakh.
(vi) Non-tribal customers are spending more than tribal buyers on all types of products.
Behavioral processes of a sample of 200 sellers’ respondents have been studied in Chapter 5. These respondents were selected from various ethnic groups. Information on respondent’s martial status, social status, education, family background, present occupation, earning status, and dependants have been collected and presented in different tables. From these tables numbers of observations are made and it is concluded that the selling processes and entrepreneurial traits are inherent among various ethnic groups. The observations made from Chapter 5 are:
(i) In case of hill tribal more females are sellers than male
(ii) Out of total only 29% are illiterates and among the non-tribal sellers 63.75% are graduates. About 1/4th of the sellers among non-tribal are farmers whereas in tribal sellers most of them are either in agriculture or in business.
(iii) Among the respondents 72% of the sellers are having agriculture background followed by business 23% and 7% service class.
(iv) 39% of the sellers have one to five beegahs of cultivated lands followed by 34% had no cultivated land.
(v) Three fourth of the sellers in the market are permanent sellers and rest of others are temporary sellers.
(vi) About 28% of buyers have invested between Rs. 5000 to Rs. 10,000. 23.5% have invested below Rs. 1000. About Rs. 15,000/- were the very big suppliers of cloth, footwear and grocery who are mostly Bengalis.
(vii) It has been noticed that nearly 1/4th (22.5%) respondents were selling vegetables followed by cloths, (21.5%), groceries (14%) domestic service, (11%) and so on.
(viii) The hill tribal buyers were more influenced by the prices
(ix) The weekly markets served as a meeting and entertaining place for the rural people.
(x) The sellers informed that buyers generally response to quality than price followed by service, credit facilities and relations with sellers.
(xi) While talking about the customers strength 64% of the sellers informed that reasonable payment was the strength of the customers followed by good mannerism (45%) and prompt payment (26%), 3/4th of the sellers said that they behave well with their customers and provide better and prompt services.Whereas less than half said they offered good quality, range and quantity. One fourth said they also offer credit to their customers.
(xii) While talking about customers weakness 61% of the sellers informed that bargaining was the weakness of the customers and 31% sellers told that buyers wants to pay low price for high quality. 26% of the sellers said that they offer discounts to their customers, 24% sellers said they initially ask high prices than reduce it.
(xiii) 60% of the Assamese sellers told that customers made delay payments.
(xiv) 53% of the sellers informed that selling in weekly markets has proved to be a stable business, which help earning them reasonable profits.
(xv) Irregular sales during the off-season is a negative factor in this market. Some of them even incur loss in this market.
(xvi) More than 60% of sellers respondents informed that their sale profit and number of customers should be more
(xvii) More than 60% of sellers informed that they could moderately fulfill their customers expectations like range of products, quality and quantity and price.
(xviii) Majority of non tribal sellers informed that service provided by the facilitators were high whereas majority of tribal respondents said that the service provided were moderate.
(xix) More than 50% of the sellers said that they paid regularly to the facilitators.
(xx) Only 2% of the sellers who are non tribal received financial supports from the government. Only 1% of the sellers received training from the government whereas others could not received because government did not take any initiatives in this regard.
(xxi) More than half of them said that they have never participated in any development work of the market
(xxii) Through interaction, it was revealed that more than 50% of sellers had no idea about government policies and agencies. Their ignorance has let them not to approach government help.
To know the dynamics of the consumer behavior 300 buyers (respondents) from various ethnic groups were interviewed. The tabulated data is presented in the tables 6.1 to 6.13. Through these tables the following points have been emerged.
(i) 73% of the buyers are male, 82% of these buyers are Hindus and the percentage of illiterate buyers is higher than the literate. More than 1/3rd of them are agriculturist.
(ii) The most common products purchased in the traditional weekly market are groceries, vegetables, fruits, clothes, shoes,
(iii) The most common facilitators among the buyers are panwala, (63%), tea suppliers (56%), and cycle repair shops (50%). More Tribal buyers use palwala than non-tribal buyers. From the market it has been observed that demand of customers and demand and supply of the community are the most influencing factor of the market. Quality of goods and the new products are brought in the market by the Assamese to increase their sale.
(iv) Assamese and tribal give more importance to quality in comparison to the non Assamese
(v) Most of the village respondents prefer to buy clothes from the weekly market and even the second hand cloths were purchased from the people who are below poverty line.
(vi) Poor infrastructure was the main de merit of the weekly market . Buyers are not satisfied by the products available and the condition of the market. Non tribal respondents complaint more about poor infrastructure whereas tribal respondent complaint about the scarcity of the desired products
(vii) While comparing the regular market, with the weekly market it is observer that branded and legal products are available in the regular market and the markets are well planned. Customers and buyers of regular market are having good relations. But the tribal buyers complaints that in the regular market price is higher than the weekly market. regular markets. Weekly markets are also compared by the market near to residence and door-to-door selling.
(viii) The time spent in the market ranges from four hours to one hour. . Maximum number of buyers out of which more are non-tribal spent two hours in the market.
(ix) Most of the purchasers spent morning and afternoon in the market than the evening.
(x) Bargaining in buying vegetables, clothes, is common among all the purchasers whereas for groceries, medicine, and books fixed prices are paid.
(xi) Only one fourth of the buyers buy on credit.
(xii) Most of the respondents complaints that the quality of the products is low and even less quantity is given. .
In Chapter 7 facilitating system of the market has been mentioned. Mahaladras, who are acting as Chief Executive Officers in markets are all men and belong to age group to 30 –to 50 years. Mahaladars are generally local persons land belong to the community by which the market are dominating for example in Kokila market the community was Bodo and the Mahaldars are also Bodo. None of the Mahaldars are illiterate and most of them have completed their XIIth Standard. Mahaldars responsibility towards the market is cleanliness of the market, providing better infrastructure, maintaining peaceful atmosphere and security. Some of the tribal market lack in security because terrorist group is active in those areas. The Mahaldars solve all the problems of the market through the negotiation and is the Chief Controlling Authority in the market.. For example once fire took place and destroyed the market in Dhekiajuli and Lokra, the Mahaldars took account of the property damaged and applies for government aid. The weekly markets serve as source of income for all the Mahaldars The Mahaldars get market on lease for 52 years. The Mahaldras also negotiates conflicts among the middlemen, sellers, and buyers. Higher the bid value, higher the revenue generated and thus higher was the share of the Mahaldars. In some of the markets the tax collectors themselves act as Supervisor and the Mahaldars are Chief Controller and Supervisor. In these markets some conflicts have been observed between the tax collectors and then by the Mahaldars. Women are seen actively as buyers in the markets and as facilitates also except in Rupohi and Bhilgaon markets where women participation was totally absent.
Taxes are different for different markets. Taxes depend upon the bid value of the market, though the Government provides a tax rate for different segment sellers, in reality it was not followed because the tax rates are very less in comparison to the increase bid value of the market. Legally and officially tax rates should be collected only from the sellers but in reality, taxes are also collected from the buyers and exporters. A tax rates varies segment wise, product wise, rate of product, seller wise, market land area occupied and type of supplier. The tax rates are higher in the hill markets than the plain markets. Tax collectors are appointed by the Mahaldars and the number of tax collectors is also decided by the Mahaldars. The Mahaldars do not get high amount of taxes from facilitators, as there were only few facilitators in weekly markets like Hotelwala, Tailors, Cobblers, etc. Though a good amount of revenue is collected from these markets every year, the Government does very little for the development of the market. Only DRDA has constructed 41 tin pucca sheds in 2003 in Lokra market, and about 20 tin pucca sheds in Mission Charali market. The local people of the market cooperate with the Mahaldar in growth and development of the market. The markets serve as a platform for the local unemployed on their livelihood.
The middlemen of the weekly market play a very important role in the development of a weekly market in a particular region. The middlemen dealt in only selected items for example, vegetables, livestock, and commercial crops. Majority (40%) of the respondents dealing with perishable products were prompted by unemployment to opt for this profession followed by family business (27%) and lack of financial resources (16%). But majority (80%) of them dealing with durable goods were prompted by the business followed by unemployment (16%) and family business (10%).
While collecting data on the respondents perception on the market performance it has been noticed that more than 3/4th of the respondents informed that infrastructure like, muddy markets site, absence of drinking water facilities, absence of toilets, were the main problems. Among all market partners, the facilitators plays very important role in smooth running of the activities. The nature of the services and activities rendered by them were Buswala, Thalewala, Truckwala, Rickshawala, Carwala, Haus cart wala, Autowala, Panwala, tea supplier, etc. All these facilitators were not found in the rural oriented weekly market.
Since the objective of the study is to know the Strength Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats (SWOT) of weekly market chapter 8 is about SWOT analysis in reference to:
· Market behaviors prospective
· Sellers behaviors perspective
· Buyers behaviors perspective
· Mahaldars behaviors perspective
· Facilitators behaviors perspective
· Middlemen behaviors perspective
