Farmer Producer Organisations and Smallholder Welfare: Evidence on Input Benefits, Marketing Performance, and Livelihood Impact from Guntur District, Andhra Pradesh, India

Background: FPOs in Andhra Pradesh, especially in Guntur district, have become crucial institutions supporting high-cost agriculture by enabling input access, collective marketing, and linking farmers to credit, technology, and welfare schemes. Aims: The study is to analyze the input access benefits, marketing performance, price realization and livelihood impact of Farmer Producer Organization membership among marginal farmers of Guntur district of Andhra Pradesh and also to predict the socio economic factors influencing the same. Study Design: A cross-sectional survey design was followed and the data were collected through structured interview schedule by conducting face to face interviews in Telugu with the FPO member farmers from the selected mandals (blocks) of Guntur. Place and Duration of Study: This research was undertaken in Guntur district of Andhra Pradesh, India which ranks as a leading district in agriculture in the state, the district also stands first in chili, cotton and paddy cultivation. Data were collected in the agricultural year 2024–25. Methodology: A stratified random sampling technique was used to select 75 farmers who are members of FPOs from five FPOs that were purposively selected across different mandals in Guntur district, the sample was drawn considering the factors viz., landholding categories, type of crops and period of membership. A composite Benefit Perception Score, Price Realisation Score, and Livelihood Impact Score were calculated by summing Likert-scale answers within each of the item sets, and these scores were utilized as dependent variables in the regressions. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, chi-square test of association, and OLS multiple regression analysis. Data analysis Descriptive statistics, chi-square test of association and Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) multiple regression were used. Results: Overall, 73.3 per cent of respondents showed moderate and above savings in input costs, 89.3 per cent of the respondents reported better price realisation and 81.3 per cent gained higher net farm returns per acre after becoming the members of FPO. Chi-square analyses revealed significant relationships between education and input benefit perception (χ² = 16.84, p = 0.002), and between size of landholding and improvement in price realisation (χ² = 14.62, p = 0.023). Regression results showed length of membership, market channel diversity and training exposure as the best predictors of price realisation (R² = 0.63) and livelihood impact (R² = 0.67). Conclusion: FPOs provide quantifiable, and statistically significant, advantages in input, marketing, as well as livelihood aspects to smallholder farmers of Guntur district. But, structural biases towards bigger, and better-educated members needs to be redressed through proactive policy reforms, infusion of working capital, and through enabling capacity building measures that allow for equitable and sustainable farmer welfare outcomes in all categories of members.