Spaces of Corporate Control in Agriculture: A Critical Study of Contract Farming in the Indian State of Punjab

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dc.contributor.advisorDas, Raju J.
dc.creatorShrimali, Ritika
dc.date.accessioned2015-01-26T14:53:52Z
dc.date.available2015-01-26T14:53:52Z
dc.date.copyright2014-07-16
dc.date.issued2015-01-26
dc.date.updated2015-01-26T14:53:52Z
dc.degree.disciplineGeography
dc.degree.levelDoctoral
dc.degree.namePhD - Doctor of Philosophy
dc.description.abstractThe dissertation is about the corporate control over agricultural production through contract farming. In contract farming, farmers sell a certain quantity of farm products to an industrial company at a predetermined price. In this process, and in principle, the industrial company has a secure access to the raw material it needs, and the farmers have a secure market. Contract farming is a world-wide phenomenon. The dissertation studies contract farming in the Indian context. The main thesis of the dissertation is that there is an increasing corporatisation of Indian agriculture, and that this process is mediated by the state institutions at the national and provincial scales, with certain ‘developmental’ consequences. Contract farming as an agrarian accumulation process has four aspects. It is, first of all, a structure of relations of production and exchange involving productive capital (both in agriculture and industry), mercantile capital, and finance capital; so contract farming is more than just the market-contract between farmers and industrial companies. It is a way to increase productive consumption of technologies in rural areas produced by agri-input corporations. Secondly, as a structure of multiple relations of production and exchange and as a mode of accumulation as associated with these relations, CF has an important condition of existence: the state. CF is internally related to the state. The capitalist Indian state has been creating conditions for ‘neoliberal agriculture’ that are conducive to contract farming. The state has been doing this, more or less, in the interest of big business (domestic and foreign), ideologically justifying its actions in the name of national development. Thirdly, CF as a relatively new political-economic project is distinctively contradictory: while CF has become a conduit through which several modern mechanical and biological technologies have been introduced, such introduction of new technologies exhibits a class bias. Finally, the logic of the operation of the CF unequally affects the conditions of working peasants who are subjected to the pressure of class differentiation, as well as the wage-workers, who are subjected heightened level of exploitation which is necessary for contract companies to make large profits.
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/10315/28242
dc.language.isoen
dc.rightsAuthor owns copyright, except where explicitly noted. Please contact the author directly with licensing requests.
dc.subjectAgriculture
dc.subjectGeography
dc.subject.keywordsSmall-producersen_US
dc.subject.keywordsAgriculture Developmenten_US
dc.subject.keywordsIII world Developmenten_US
dc.subject.keywordsCapitalismen_US
dc.subject.keywordsAgrarian changeen_US
dc.subject.keywordsIndiaen_US
dc.subject.keywordsSouth Asiaen_US
dc.subject.keywordsDevelopmenten_US
dc.subject.keywordsIdeologyen_US
dc.subject.keywordsLabouren_US
dc.subject.keywordsStateen_US
dc.subject.keywordsGovernanceen_US
dc.subject.keywordsRelation between Technology-Societyen_US
dc.subject.keywordsRelations of Productionen_US
dc.subject.keywordsPolitical Economyen_US
dc.subject.keywordsPunjaben_US
dc.subject.keywordsContract Farmingen_US
dc.subject.keywordsCorporate led developmenten_US
dc.subject.keywordsCorporationsen_US
dc.subject.keywordsTransnational Capitalen_US
dc.titleSpaces of Corporate Control in Agriculture: A Critical Study of Contract Farming in the Indian State of Punjab
dc.typeElectronic Thesis or Dissertationen_US

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