Product Differentiation

The objective of the article “Product Differentiation to Tackle Farm Distress” by Devesh Roy and Smriti Verma (EPW, 11 May 2019) is to look at the farming crisis situation through the lens of product differentiation as a mitigating factor of low-income levels among the agricultural community, especially small and medium farmers. The authors need to be appreciated for identifying one of the structural and critical dimensions of agrarian distress, which is rarely dealt with in the agricultural policy discourse. It must be noted that the inadequate access to the market makes farmers vulnerable in terms of selling the crop produces for a lesser price than

the actual rates augmenting to low-level income and the cycle of indebtedness. In this context, while highlighting a variety of demand- and supply-side contributing factors of agricultural distress, it is observed that “what is missing from this set of explanations—which we want to highlight—is the lack of product differentiation that has restricted value generation in agriculture” (p 19).