Helping farmer producer organisations understand why members stay or leave

What is shaping agriculture

Agriculture supports a large share of rural livelihoods, and its buying decisions are made close to the soil: at the village dealer, the cooperative and the neighbouring lead farmer. Seasonality, weather and credit shape almost every choice a farmer makes.

• Purchase decisions cluster in short pre-sowing windows
• Trusted dealers and lead farmers carry more weight than advertising
• Digital payments, agri-fintech and crop insurance are changing how farmers buy

A development foundation, working in Odisha & Jharkhand. Client identity is withheld to protect confidentiality.

Organisation

A development foundation

Sector

Agriculture

Team engaged

Market Research

Services

Qualitative research, Quantitative research, Reporting & insights

The foundation supported dozens of farmer producer organisations, but membership was uneven. Some FPOs thrived while others lost members after their first year. The foundation wanted to know what members valued and what made them drift away.

• Deliver on the brief: helping farmer producer organisations understand why members stay or leave.
• Understand the views, needs and behaviour of FPOs.
• Understand the views, needs and behaviour of members.
• Measure how widespread each pattern is, and explain the reasons behind it.
• Give the client evidence it can act on within 8 weeks.

The work focused on 24 FPOs and 1,450 members.

• FPOs24
• members1,450

Audiences we typically reach in agriculture

Farmers and growersAgri-input dealersCooperatives and FPOsAgronomists and extension workersAgri-fintech users

Coverage: Odisha & Jharkhand. Market: India.

• India

A mixed-method design: structured research measured how widespread each pattern was, and qualitative conversations explained why.

1. 1Brief
2. 2Member survey
3. 3In-depth interviews with FPO leaders
4. 4Insight

We started with conversations with FPO leaders and long-standing members to understand how each organisation worked. Those insights shaped a member survey covering services used, trust in leadership, payment timeliness and perceived benefits. Interviews were conducted in Odia, Hindi and local dialects.

Qualitative researchQuantitative researchReporting & insights

FPOs

24

members

1,450

• Qualitative participants were recruited purposively to cover the full range of experiences that mattered, rather than for statistical representation.

leader interviews

40

• Interviews and discussions were led by experienced moderators using a guide agreed with the client.

• Recordings and transcripts for every session
• Re-screening of qualitative recruits
• Logic and range checks on the final data
• Work carried out under our ISO 20252 quality procedures

• Cross-tabulation by key groups and locations
• Significance testing on the differences that mattered
• Thematic coding of interviews and discussions
• Journey and decision mapping

• Members stayed when the FPO paid them promptly for produce and shared simple accounts at village meetings.
• Delayed payments and unclear decisions were the strongest reasons for leaving.

Trust in small organisations is built on visible, predictable money flows.

• Build on the core insight: trust in small organisations is built on visible, predictable money flows.
• Focus effort where the evidence was strongest: members stayed when the FPO paid them promptly for produce and shared simple accounts at village meetings.
• Re-measure after the changes to confirm the effect.

• The foundation built a basic accounts-sharing practice and payment-timeliness tracking into its support programme.

What changed in the business as a result of the work. Impact is described qualitatively.

• Insight report and management presentation
• Cleaned data file and data tables
• Interview summaries and key verbatims

• Repeat the measure after changes are in place to track progress.
• A natural follow-on question: which channels reach farmers before sowing?