Among the various horticulture crops grown in Bharuch District, banana is a staple fruit crop and is an important avenue for generation of skilled employment as well as self-employment opportunities in both rural and urban areas. For the purpose of our investigation, a sample of 120 respondents were selected by multistage random sampling procedure from the study area. The cost of cultivation and returns were estimated using various cost concepts viz; cost A, cost B, cost C1 and cost C2. The economic analysis of tissue culture banana production revealed that the per hectare total cost of banana cultivation was found to be ` 2,14,192 due to greater use of human labour in various farm operations. The proportionate share of cost-A, cost-B and cost-C1 was 81.28, 88.64 and 90.91 per cent, respectively. The banana growers made a gross return of `5, 92, 954 and net profit of `3, 78,762 per hectare mainly due to the higher bunch weight and better quality of tissue culture bananas. The benefit cost ratio was worked out to be 1.2.77 indicating profitability of tissue culture banana farming enterprise. The constraint analysis revealed that fluctuations in selling price (1st rank), followed by labour scarcity (2nd rank) and damage due to unfavourable weather conditions (3rd rank) were the top three major problems faced by banana growers in the study area.

Tissue culture, cost of cultivation, cost of production, cost concept, returns

An economic analysis of tissue-cultured banana has been presented through studying their costs and returns. The study suggests that tissue-culture banana is a profitable farming enterprise and can play an important role in doubling farmers’ income. The higher yields, bunch weight, better quality, higher prices as well as uniformity in harvesting were the major factors responsible for the higher profitability. Hence, the study suggested that farmers should be encouraged to adopt tissue culture banana to get higher yield and profits.

Deepa Hiremath, H.H. Mistry, L.R. Dubey and G. Netravathi (2022). Estimating Economics of Tissue Culture Banana: A Case of Bharuch District in South Gujarat. Biological Forum – An International Journal, 14(3): 1655-1658.