Book Description

The coir industry is the traditional, agro based, labour intensive , small scale cottage industry of Kerala. Although it is one of the foreign exchange earners of India, it is struggling for existence because of varying reasons. Both the Central and State governments are giving priority support programmes in protecting the industry as the poor people from backward classes from coastal belt are solely depending on this industry for their bread. Yet, the government intervention to reorganise the industry on co-operative lines has not achieved the desired results. The coir cooperatives continue to be a poor performer. The coir cooperatives failed drastically to ensure regular employment and better wages to the coir workers. In this context, this book is the outcome of a comprehensive study to understand the performance of coir cooperatives in terms of productivity, covering various factors like, labour, capital, wage, intermediate inputs, productivity, intensity, etc., with a special focus on its elasticity, total factor productivity and profitability. This book consists of six chapters describing the entire body of the research work, including the socio-economic conditions of the coir workers. The book would be of immense use in many ways for the administrators, policy makers, planners, and researchers. The book is a product of a doctoral thesis entitled "Coir Co-operative Societies In Kerala-An Economic Analysis" submitted to the University of Kerala on 31-05-2012. Due to many reasons, the data used in this study could not be made up-to-date, but that does not invalidate the findings and their interpretations presented in this book.