Paper short abstract:

Contract farming enables capital accumulation without dispossession and control over land, labour and production by firms through intermediaries from socially advantaged castes to extort the quality of raw materials without direct controls on smallholders mostly from socially deprived castes.

Paper long abstract:

Critics of contract farming argue it is an alternative to rural land grabbing by agribusiness firms. However, how the agribusiness firms control the land, labour and production of smallholder farmers is not given sufficient consideration. Moreover, the social relations of production, labour arrangements and production controls are overlooked. Particularly in India where historical deprivation of socially deprived castes persists in access to inputs and output markets. We propose a mixed methods research approach and conducted two phases of fieldwork in two highly potato concentrate districts: Bankura and Hooghly of the smallholder farm dominant state of West Bengal. We argue that within the shrinking state support to agrarian and rural livelihoods, contract farming enables land and production controls by agribusiness firms through intermediaries. The unequal distribution of means of production, social status, access to capital and control over the farming community through farming-related business favour the upper caste rural elite to become commission agents in the alternative livelihood opportunities. In the context of limited access to agricultural land for agribusiness firms, contract farming serves as an alternative to the acquisition of rural land by facilitating a transition from land grabbing to power grabbing. This transition is arranged through intermediaries predominantly belonging to socially advantaged castes to take on control over the land, labour, and production activities of smallholders, primarily from socially deprived castes.