Village Level Studies

GT - Institutions, Markets, Policy & Impacts

Back	VLS since 2001

Village Level Studies

Background

Village studies are one of the most efficient ways to understand the farming systems in rural areas and also help in identifying the socio-economic and institutional constraints faced by the farming community. ICRISAT Economics Program initiated the Village Level Studies (VLS) at six locations in Andhra pradesh and Maharashtra states in India in May 1975 (Fig 1). It is later extended to Gujarat in 1980 and Madhya Pradesh in 1981 in India and few villages in Africa. ICRISAT's village studies were designed to suit multi-disciplinary research work where agro-biological and social scientists can work together in the real farm situation. The objectives of the village studies may differ according to the needs of the researcher and thus its methodology. The major objective of Village Level Studies (VLS) was to understand the socio-economic, agro-biological, and institutional constraints to agricultural development in the semi-arid tropical (SAT) area. To achieve this goal, information is gathered with the help of twelve designed questionnaires from selected 40 households in each location over ten year period constituting now the World famous "ICRISAT VLS Panel Data". The information gathered from these studies help in generating prospective technologies which are feasible and acceptable to the farmers. Secondly, VLS locations may also help in testing and modifying the technologies generated by ICRISAT. Hence, the objectives of ICRISAT village studies are limited in scope and its size. In brief VLS are primarily designed to collect relevant farm level data to assist ICRISAT's research system in its task of generating new technologies suited to the needs and means of the SAT farmers. This is achieved through observing and monitoring why farmers do what they do. The gathered information is analyzed by world scientific community for studying various aspects of farming in the SAT.

Research agenda of the ICRISAT Economics program was to identify constraints to agricultural development in the SAT and alleviating them through technological and institutional change. Given that objective the following priority research areas were described with a set of hypothesis. The economic hypotheses tested in the village level studies were grouped into eight areas in order of priority and urgency.

(1) Economic and environmental causes of present cultivation practices
(2) Seasonal pattern of resource availability and bottlenecks (labor, power and water)
(3) Consumption and nutritional status of the low income population groups
(4) Impact of risk and uncertainty on farmers behavior and adoption of new techniques
(5) Marketing and consumer acceptance problems
(6) Group action problems
(7) Income distribution and distribution of benefits from technology
(8) Speed of diffusion of new technology

Several of these areas shared common empirical features. That commonality could be explained by collecting multiple observations on the same units. Thus developing a longitudinal data base appeared to be an effective means to multiply social science research resources.

VLS Posters: VLS 1975-85: An investment that paid off , VLS 2001 onwards: Investing in the future
VLS Locations: India , Africa
VLS Data Management
Outputs from VLS data

The village level studies were conducted from 1975-85 and 1989 in Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat. The details of selected villages are as follows:

State	District	Village	Study conducted
			From	To
Andhra Pradesh	Mahbubnagar	Aurepalle¹	1975-1976	1984-85
Andhra Pradesh	Mahbubnagar	Dokur¹	1975-1976	1984-85
Maharashtra	Akola	Kanzara¹	1975-1976	1984-85
Maharashtra	Akola	Kinkheda¹	1975-1976	1984-85
Maharashtra	Sholapur	Shirapur¹	1975-1976	1984-85
Maharashtra	Sholapur	Kalman¹	1975-1976	1984-85
Gujarat	Sabarkantha	Boriya¹	1980-1981	1984-85
Gujarat	Sabarkantha	Rampura¹	1980-1981	1984-85
Madhya Pradesh	Raisen	Papda¹	1981-1982	1984-85
Madhya Pradesh	Raisen	Papda¹	1980-1981	1984-85

1.Resurveyed during 1989-90 cropping year.

Basically twelve schedules were used in collecting the necessary information. The details are as follows:
Click on the schedules below to view sample data

1	VLS-A: Household Census Schedule: This schedule contains family size and land holding details.
2	VLS-C:Household Member Schedule: This schedule contains all information about the family members like their age, sex, relationship with head, education, occupation, information about any attached laborers.
3	VLS-E: Animal Inventory Schedule: Contains number, type of livestock, and their value at the beginning of the cropping year.
4	VLS-F:Farm Implements and Machineries Schedule: In this schedule, for major implements and machineries their number and value are recorded and for minor ones, where several types of tools are involved, their total value is recorded and the details are given in the remarks column.
5	VLS-G: Farm Building Schedule: This contains information about farm buildings ie., their area in square feet and values are coded.
6	VLS-N: Stock Inventory Schedule: The quantity, value of stocks of food grains, fodder, farm inputs, fuel, building material as well as durables on hand are given in this.
7	VLS-P: Debt and Credit Schedule: Details about indebtedness, credit, insurance policies, deposits etc. are given in this one.
8	VLS-M: Monthly Price Schedule: Prices of selected commodities as recalled by different persons interviewed.
9	VLS-L: Household Transaction Schedule: This schedule gives details on consumption quantities, expenditures, income by source, production expenditure, changes in the credit and debt position of household etc.
10	VLS-K:Labor, Draft Animal and Major Machinery Utilization Schedule: The purpose of this schedule is to record the utilization which the family makes of the resources under its control like labor of family members, labor servants, owned bullocks, owned tractors and power tillers.
11	VLS-Y: Plot and Cultivation Schedule: This schedule records operation wise input-output data for each plot constituting the operational holding of a farmer. It also includes the important characteristics of each plot, sub plot such as soil type, ownership, irrigation status, land value and revenue rate.

Description	Number
M.Sc. and Ph.D. Theses	38
Journal Articles	106
Research papers	108
Special purpose surveys	21
Biological investigations	18
Books	2