Economic analysis of maize cultivation in Lucknow district of Uttar Pradesh

Abstract

Maize is the third most important crop in India next to wheat and rice. It is one of the most miracle cereal crops in the world. It has very high yield potential. In the country, maize is considered and consumed as nutritious and tasty human food. Several food dishes including chapattis are prepared from maize flour and grain. District Lucknow was selected purposively and block Moll was selected randomly. Finally, 100 farmers were selected following the proportionate random sampling technique from five selected villages. The study period pertains to agricultural year 2015-16. Overall, average cost of production was Rs 778.46 /qt. and gross income reflects direct relationship with the farm size. Average yield was found 48.41 q/ha. Major portion of cost of cultivation were accounted on human labour, seed cost, manures & fertilizers and irrigation. Return to scale in all farm size was found less than unit (that is 0.948572 in small, 0.915736 in marginal, and 0.883402 in medium farms) indicates that production of maize was characterized by decreasing return to scale in case of all categories of farms. Some new maize based products were prepared like maize infant food, maize sev, maize upma, maize flour halwa etc popularize maize among modern consumers.