MARKETING OF FISH

 Aqua Tech Fishery all levels have retailing arrangements at market, that is, a group of retailers that sell fish to consumers. In major cities like Mumbai, Solapur, Thane, Pune, Nagpur, Nasik, Ahemednagar. Akola, Amravati, Jalana, Buldhana and Jalgaon and in district towns, city corporations or municipalities manage the retail markets. In general, conditions in urban and rural retail markets are not satisfactory regarding stalls, parking, spacing, sanitation, drainage and management. Bargaining, in terms of eye estimation, is still the common practice for pricing fish. Strict grading, sorting and price tagging are ignored in retailing. Quality of the products and a standard for weighing are not enforced at all. In such a situation, cheating and exploitation are unavoidable. Fair pricing according to grade, size, origin and freshness of the fish may not be possible in the absence of standard norms of marketing practices and a lack of enforcement by legal authorities. Thus, market access is limited for the economically weaker section of the consumers.

5.1 Fish-marketing practices and structure of markets

To make fish available to consumers at the right time and in the right place requires an effective marketing system. Fishermen who catch fish by labouring overnight (from common-property water bodies) do not usually sell fish in retail markets[18]. At the break of day, they take their catches to places where Nikaries/Beparies, or retailers, meet them and bargain by the lot. At the landing point, the number of intermediaries is low. Only one or two intermediaries may approach a fisherman. Once bargaining has started, other intermediaries remain at a distance and wait for their turn to deal, should the first intermediary fail to obtain the fisherman's lot. If the first intermediary is unsuccessful, another steps in to bargain for the catch. Normally, the first Nikary/Paiker-retailer does not allow this to happen and secures the lot for himself. No open bidding exists in such a case. Therefore, the poor fisherman often falls prey to the Nikari/Bepari/Paiker-retailer's crude exploitations. A fisherman, as a seller, cannot negotiate favorable prices for himself mainly because:

• he meets buyers (intermediaries) one at a time and at different times,
• he cannot keep fish for a long time because the product is highly perishable,
• he has no specific place to sit in the market to sell his fish.

Entry into the market is difficult for fishermen for many reasons, mainly because of strong non-cooperation and resistance from the Paikers/retailers. Thus, it is obvious why fishing communities remain poor or are getting poorer over the years, although they trade an important, necessary and every-day commodity. Markets at the primary catch stage are almost completely non-competitive and therefore, exploitation is high.

A pond-farmer, who sells fish by the lot or by species, faces one or two 'nikaries' in his area. Sometimes, Nikaries/Beparies establish their own exclusive trading areas, where other nikaries do not interfere or compete openly. Therefore, a fish farmer does not encounter a market with many buyers but rather a situation in which he meets more fellow sellers than buyers. This is particularly the case in remote villages. In areas that are well connected by roads and rail, fish farmers contact wholesalers in secondary or higher secondary markets directly and negotiate prices and quantities of fish with the 'Arat's on their own initiatives. Intermediaries, particularly Aratdars, face competition from other wholesalers, which gives the secondary and higher secondary markets an oligopoly-type structure.

Figure 1. Marketing channels for open-water fish catches

Figure 2. Marketing channels at Upazila level market

An investigation for the present study revealed the following channel at an Upazila-level market (Solapur, Mumbai).

Figure 3. The other important common marketing channel

Table 22. Marketing cost (Tk) of intermediaries per quintal of fish handling in Mymensingh town

Cost items	Intermediaries involved			Total	Percent of total cost
	Bepari	Aratdar	Retailer
Transportation	107 (27%)	-	-	107	16
Wages	22 (5%)	34 (27%)	30 (22%)	86	13
Wastage	-	-	10 (8%)	10	2
Market tolls	9 (2%)	12 (9%)	10 (8%)	31	5
Aratdar's commission	215 (54%)	-	-	215	33
Containers & baskets	8 (2%)	-	6 (5%)	14	2
Personal expenses	40 (10%)	77 (62%)	66 (49%)	182	28
Telephone	-	2 (2%)	-	2	0.37
Storage and icing	-	-	12 (9%)	12	2
Total	401 (100%)	125 (100%)	135 (100%)	661	100

Table 23. Marketing margin earned by Beparies and Paiker/retailers

Intermediary	Purchase price (1)	Sale price (2)	Gross margin 3 = (2-1)	Marketing cost (4)	Net margin 5 = (3-4)
Bepari	2 798	3 507	709	401	308 (11%)
Paiker/retailer	4 193	5 022	829	135	695 (17%)