ASSUMPTIONS:

1. Mr. Sane, the manager of Fruitland Agro Ltd wants to set up a small
scale pineapple syrup processing plant in West Bengal.
2. He has broadly identified that his plant shall be located at Jalpaiguri
district of West Bengal.
3. The manager wants to set up a plant with a 60 tonnes capacity per day.
4. There are no holidays and 1 day is of 8 working hours.

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 COVERING LETTER
Trina Bhagat
Symbiosis Institute of International Business
Hinjewadi, Pune
Maharashtra.
Phone No. -+91-9503057106

To,
Mr. Sane
Fruitland Agro Ltd.
Pune.

Subject: Submission of research proposal for setting up of a

pineapple syrup processing plant in Jalpaiguri district of West
Bengal.

Respected Sir,
In The Indian Express dated 10/04/2010, you had invited
interested researchers/research organizations for undertaking a
marketing research project for setting up a small scale a pineapple
syrup processing plant in Jalpaiguri district of West Bengal. With
respect to that advertisement published by you, I wish to apply for
this project.
I have done my graduation (B.A) in Literature and presently I am
pursuing MB in Agribusiness Management from Symbiosis
Institute of International Business, Pune. Being an Agribusiness
student, I have gained knowledge regarding the theoretical as well
as the practical aspects of agriculture. Moreover I have been living
in Jalpaiguri district since my childhood, therefore I have proper
knowledge about that place and communication with the farmers
will not be a problem. The knowledge of the Place and
Management along with the basic knowledge of agriculture will
help me to do the project effectively and efficiently.

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 Under the guidance of Mr. S. V. Godbole, I have conducted a
research project titled “Prospects of establishing a small scale
tomato puree processing industry at a suitable location in
Maharashtra”. The experiences of that project have really enriched
my competency as a researcher.
I have prepared a proposal after analyzing the project. The
proposal is enclosed along with this letter for your consideration. I
hope the proposal will be up to your expectations. Please feel free
to contact in case of any further clarification.
I am eagerly looking forward to take this job.

Thanking You,
Yours truly,
Trina Bhagat
Student
MBA-ABM (2009-2011)
Symbiosis Institute of International Business

(Enclosed: Research Proposal)

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Research proposal for the establishment of pineapple
syrup processing plant in Jalpaiguri district of West
Bengal.

1. BACKGROUND:

Pineapple (Ananas comosus) is the common name for an

edible tropical plant and also its fruit. It is native to Paraguay and the
southern part of Brazil. Pineapple is eaten fresh or canned and is available as
a juice or in juice combinations. It is used in desserts, salads, as a
complement to meat dishes and in fruit cocktail. While sweet, it is known for
its high acid content. Pineapples are the only bromeliad fruit in widespread
cultivation. It is one of the most commercially important plants which carry
out CAM photosynthesis.
Pineapple is one of the commercially important fruit crops of India.
Total annual world production is estimated at 14.6 million tonnes of fruits.
India is the fifth largest producer of pineapple with an annual output of about
1.2 million tonnes. The area under pineapple cultivation in India increased
by 35% from 57 thousand ha. in 1991-92 to 77 thousand ha. in 2001-02

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whereas the production increased by 54% from 8 lakh tonnes to 12 lakh
tonnes. The states where pineapple is grown include Assam, Meghalaya,
Tripura, Manipur, West Bengal, Kerala, Karnataka and Goa. The other states
where it is grown on a small scale are Gujarat, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu,
Andhra Pradesh, Orissa, Bihar and Uttar Pradesh.
[Source: Database of National Horticulture Board, Ministry of Agriculture ,
Govt. of India.]

Important varieties cultivated in different states of India are given below :

State Varieties mostly grown

Assam & other N.E. - Kew, Queen, Mauritius
states
Kerala - Mauritius, Kew, Queen
West Bengal - Giant Kew, Queen

The fruit is a good source of vitamin A,B,C and also calcium,

magnesium, potassium and iron. It is also a good source of bromelin, a
digestive enzyme. It is consumed fresh or in the form of juice, jam, squash
and syrup. Among all forms, canned slices and juice are in much demand in
India, constituting about 70% of the production. Pineapple is mostly
consumed fresh.

There is large demand of pineapple products within the country.

Bulk of the total production is consumed in institutional sector namely
defence, hotels and airlines. The major exporting countries of fresh pineapple
are Philippines, Mexico, Brazil, Taiwan, Malaysia and South Africa. Leading
importing countries are France, Japan, USA, Italy, Germany, Spain, UK and
Canada. The trend in export of fresh pineapples from India has increased
considerably from 138 tonnes in 1999-2000 to 837 tonnes in 2001-02.

Pineapple is suitable for cultivation in humid tropics. The fruit grows

well near the sea coast as well as in the interior; so long the temperatures are
not extreme. The optimum temperature required for successful cultivation is
220-320 C. High temperature at night is deleterious for the growth of the plant
and a difference of at least 40 C between day and night temperatures is
desirable. It can be grown up to 1,000 m. above sea level, if the area is frost
free. The rainfall requirement ranges from 100-150 cm.

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 Sandy loam soils with pH between 5.0-6.0 are ideal for the growth of the
plants. The land is prepared for planting by ploughing or digging followed
by leveling. Depending on the nature of land, trenches of convenient length,
about 90 cm. widths and 15-30 cm. depth are prepared.

The ideal time of planting is 12-15 months before the peak flowering season
under natural conditions, which varies from December to March in different
regions. Time of planting also varies from place to place depending upon the
time of onset of the monsoon and the intensity of its precipitation. The fruits
are harvested for canning purpose when there is a slight change at the base of
developing fruits. The fruits used for table purpose are retained till they
develop golden yellow colour.

2. INTRODUCTION TO THE RESEARCHER:

The research is done by a student pursuing two-year full-time MBA
(Agribusiness) from Symbiosis Institute of International Business, Pune. .
She is a graduate (B.A) in Literature from St Xavier’s College Kolkata. She
has undertaken a project titled “Prospects of establishing a small scale
tomato puree processing industry at a suitable location in Maharashtra”. This
project was done under the guidance of Prof. S.V. Godbole, an expert of
marketing research and one of the best faculties of the Applied Marketing
Research in India.

3. MANAGERIAL BRIEF:
Manager is an entrepreneur who wants to establish a small-scale pineapple
syrup processing unit based on suitable technology which would be
economical for his limited capacity, in Jalpaiguri district of West Bengal
with a budget of Rs. 1, 00,000. He wants researcher/research organization to
identify the production capacity of such plant within this budget and the raw
material requirement. Manager is also interested in knowing the problems in
cultivation practices, storage practices (if any) and marketing practices, and
the farmers’ willingness to supply their produce to him under what condition.

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 4. OBJECTIVES AND OPERATIONAL DEFINITION:
4.1. Objectives based on secondary data:
• To study and suggest a suitable technology which will
economical for a small scale pineapple syrup processing unit
with 60 tons per day capacity.
 Sub-Objectives: To study,
• The varieties suitable for pineapple syrup industry.
• The various inputs required for setting up a small
scale pineapple syrup processing unit.
• And suggest the number of days the processing
plant will operate in a year.
4.2. Objectives based on primary data:
• To conduct survey on farmers who cultivate pineapples in the
Jalpaiguri district.
 Sub-Objectives: To study,
• The varieties of pineapple cultivated.
• The problems in pineapple cultivation.
• The problems in storage practices.
• The marketing practices followed by the farmers.
• Farmers’ willingness to supply their produce and
under what condition.

4.3. Operational Definition:

 Farmers: They are people engaged in cultivation of

pineapples with an area of more than or equal to 1 acre.
 Cultivation practices: The practice of growing
pineapples.

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 Storage practices: The practice of storing
pineapples before selling it in the market.

 Marketing: Process of selling pineapples to

buyers after harvesting.

5. PROPOSED RESEARCH DESIGN

5.1. Exploratory Research:

After the finalization of the managerial brief with the manager,

secondary data will be collected first and examined prior to the
collection of primary data.

5.1.1. Secondary data:

Secondary data is required to get information about certain
important topics. These topics are as follows:

a) General crop characteristics.

b) Areas under pineapple cultivation.
c) Area under pineapple cultivation in Jalpaiguri district.
d) Population data, literacy data, etc. of that area.
e) Cultivation practices followed for growing pineapple.
f) Different products of pineapple and their uses.
g) Additional products that can be developed in
the plant with same amount of raw material.
h) Financial aspects of cultivation.
i) Information on marketing practices and
problems in marketing.

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 j) Sources of procurement of pineapple.
k) Government policies regarding procurement, subsidy in
setting of processing units, and marketing.
l) Information from suppliers of machinery and
finished products.

The following sources shall be referred for the collection of

information:

 Websites of various institutions/ organizations.

 Agriculture magazines and journals.
 Research papers.
 Government publications.
 Project reports on different aspects of pineapple.

5.1.2. A visits to the area of operation:

The area visits shall be conducted to Jalpaiguri District to

collect the required information for setting up a pineapple
syrup processing plant in West Bengal.

5.1.3. Focus groups

Focus group discussions of 8-12 farmers growing pineapple
in at least one acre of land is proposed to be conducted.
Focus group will give a better understanding of the various
practices followed by farmers and their respective problems.
This information will be beneficial while designing an
appropriate questionnaire.

Secondary data will help in getting knowledge about the various

aspects of the crop. It will help in identifying sampling frame and
framing of the questionnaire. It can also be used for comparing the
economical aspects of pineapple.

5.2. Data Collection Design:

5.2.1. Survey Type: Mall Interview

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 Reason for Mall Interview:

 Flexibility:
The research requires a direct and open communication
between the interviewer and the respondent, especially for
the open ended questions. Since other methods of survey
namely telephonic, mail or electronic survey methods do
not establish such communications, we remain with
personnel interviews, ie, farm, home or mall survey
method. Personnel interviews allow the investigator to
explain and clarify difficult questions and entail probing
and prompting during the survey to enhance validity,
diversity and exhaustiveness.

 Quantity of information:

Since the questionnaire will be semi-structured, (i.e. some open

ended questions and some closed ended questions) and contain
large amount of data to be collected, so farm, home or mall
interview is the obvious choice for the survey method. Farm or
home interview helps in easy recording of open ended questions
with more responses than mall interview. Thus the former is a
better choice for survey method. Further, a questionnaire requires
a minimum of 15-20 minutes for completion. Since this much
time is not there with the respondent in mall interview, farm or
home interview would have been the best option for the survey.
But due to the time and budget constraints farm or home
interview is not possible to conduct. So, mall survey is the most
convenient option for the research.

5.2.2. Type of questionnaire : Semi structure, Open

questionnaire.

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 Semi structure, open questionnaire is proposed because it is
necessary to keep some of the questions open ended as the
secondary data does not indicate all possible responses.
Responses to some questions, for example, “What are your
terms and conditions?” do not have any fixed response, and
hence, should be kept open ended. Similarly, “What did you
use for sowing?” will have only two options of seeds or
seedlings as response, so it should be kept as a multiple choice
question. Further, for questions like “What were the problems
faced by you in sowing of seeds?” there are multiple responses,
so the question will be kept with multiple choice with a various
relevant options with the last option left open ended for
mentioning any other problem apart from those listed in options.
Therefore, it is proposed to make the questionnaire semi-
structured. The respondents will be able to give valuable insight
regarding the problems faced by them in growing pineapple,
and this would help in taking better decision.
5.2.3. Classificatory Variable:

Classificatory variable for the research project

shall be land area under cultivation of pineapple
possessed by the respondents. This is because size of
land definitely influences the cultivation practices,
production, marketing practices and relevant
problems faced by the respondents.
Variety will also be another classificatory variable
because it is important to know whether the farmer is
growing suitable or non suitable variety of pineapple
for syrup production.
Other variables like age, gender etc is not going to
be classificatory variables, since they are not going to
have a significant impact on the production aspects
and availability of pineapple.

5.2.4. Scaling:

Comparative method of scaling is proposed. Scaling

would be used for data related to the problems faced
by the respondents during post harvest activities,

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 storage and marketing. It will help in determining the
major problems and conditions, on which the
manager should focus, while procurement of
pineapple.

6. PROPOSED SAMPLING DESIGN:

6.1. Sample size:
For the given research, the respondents will be member(s) of
household growing pineapple is an area more than equal to 1 acre.
So the proposed sample size for the research is 375. [For details
refer to Annexure I]

6.2. Sample type:

Non probabilistic sampling technique shall be adopted. Probability

sampling is avoided as the sampling has to be done on the basis of
Mall Interview, and it is not possible to pre specify every potential
sample of a given sample that could be drawn with their
probability of being selected. Thus due to inadequacy of sampling
frame and not to make the research complicated, non- probabilistic
sampling technique shall be adopted. Efforts shall be made to
avoid selection biases while selecting the respondents for better
representation.
Among non probabilistic sampling techniques, Quota sampling
shall be done where the sample elements selected fit the control
characteristic of being a pineapple cultivator with land area of 1

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 acre or more. Quota ensures that the composition of the sample is
same as the composition of the population with respect to the
characteristic of interest.

6.2. Sampling
procedure:

Farmers will be divided into three categories on the

basis of total land area under pineapple cultivation viz.
small (<1 acre area), medium (1-3acre) and, large (>3
acre). Land holding has been taken as classificatory
variable because cultivation practices, production,
storage and marketing practices are affected by the size
of the land holding. Moreover, size gives a fair
representation of each category of farmer. Within each
quota, simple random sampling will be done to obtain
the total sample.

7. PROPOSED FIELDWORK DESIGN:

7.1. Organizational Structure:

Organizational design shall be composed as shown in
figure 7.1.:
Figure: 7.1

RESEARCHER

SUPERVISOR IN CHARGE OF TRAINER

FIELDWORK

ASSISTANT SUPERVISOR
SYSTEM EXPERT

13
 INVESTIGATOR
DATA ENTRY
OPERATORS

 Researcher:

There will be one researcher. The supervisor, trainer, field

incharge, and system expert will function under his supervision.
The researcher will be involved in the following tasks:
• Preliminary analysis

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 • Finalization of objectives
• Questionnaire design
• Sampling design
• Recruitment and selection
• Data analysis
• Report writing

 Trainer:

A trainer will be a person who is an expert in the field of research.

He will be responsible for giving fieldwork training to the
investigators.

 Supervisor:

Supervisor will be responsible for supervising and coordinating the

activities of the investigator.

 Investigators:

Five investigators will be appointed for surveying and collecting

data

 System Expert:

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 System expert will be a person with good computer skills. He will
be responsible for coding and the data entry operators.

 Data entry Operators:

They will be responsible for data cleaning and entry of data.

7.2. Activity Chart:

Activity chart, which shows estimated duration of each activity

proposed to be conducted in weeks, is prepared with the help of
Microsoft Office Project. All the work is divided into hours. The
data is then converted to weeks, by assuming that 1 day is of 8
working hours. The estimated duration of the research project
comes out to be 560 hours i.e. 10 weeks.

Table 7.2.1 shows the estimated duration of various activities

proposed to be undertaken during the research.

Table 7.2.1

Sl. No Activity Hours Days Predecessors

required
1 Secondary data search 16 2
2 Finalization of Objectives 16 2 1
3 Research design 24 3 2
4 Questionnaire design 40 5 3

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 5 Sampling design 32 4 4
6 Recruitment and selection 24 3 5
7 Training 24 3 6
8 Allocation of jobs 8 1 7
9 Fieldwork 224 28 8,4,5
10 Data cleaning, coding and 112 14 9
data entry
11 Tabulation and analysis 24 3 10
12 Draft report writing 16 2 11
13 Final report submission 16 2 12

Table 7.2.2 shows the duration in weeks required for the project.

Table 7.2.2

WEEKS
Activity 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10
Secondary data search
Finalization of Objectives
Research design
Questionnaire design
Sampling design
Recruitment and selection

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 Training
Allocation of jobs
Fieldwork
Data cleaning, coding and
data entry
Tabulation and analysis
Draft report writing
Final report submission

8. ANALYTICAL DESIGN:
The data collected will be coded and then entered into an excel spread
sheet. Two sets of data entry shall be made in order to perform cross
check and bound checks. For analysis, the respondents shall be divided
on the basis of land area under cultivation of pineapples and the
varieties used for cultivation. The statistical techniques of z- test will
be applied to check whether the classification of respondents
according to land and varieties were significantly different or not. If

18
 the total sample size of the respondent under each category is more
than 25 then there will not be any need for performing t-test.

9. FINANCIAL REQUIREMENT:

Budgetary requirement has been divided into three parts:

 Personnel (30% of the total budget)

 Field work (40% of the total budget)
 Office overhead (30% o the total budget)

Estimated financial requirements for the entire research project are

calculated below.

9.1. Personnel (except field work) :

Researcher would be paid Rs.20, 000, system expert would

be paid Rs.3, 000, data entry operator would be paid 1, 000
and assistant would be paid 1,000for the whole project.

9.2. Field Work:

Salary (fieldwork + TA/DA) paid to supervisor, trainer, and

investigator.
This is shown below in table 9.2

Table 9.2

Days Rate Cost

for ( Rs/ (In Rs.)
field Day)
work

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Supervisor 22 300 6600
Trainer 3 800 2400
Investigator 1 20 250 5000
Investigator 2 20 250 5000
Investigator 3 20 250 5000
Investigator 4 20 250 5000

TOTAL 29000

9.3. Office and administrative overheads:

This includes all the expenses incurred on:
a) Stationery
b) Printing
c) Photo stat
d) Telephone
e) Other items

On an estimate it would amount to Rs.15, 000

9.4. Miscellaneous Expenses:

It includes expenses incurred on consultancy with

experts, conducting focal group discussions etc.
These will amount up to Rs.12500

9.5. Total financial requirements for the research project

amount to Rs. 92,500 as shown below in table 9.5:

Table 9.5

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Particulars Amount
(Rs.)
Researcher 20000
System Expert 3000
Data entry operator 1000
Assistant 1000
Field Work 40000
Office and administrative 15000
overheads
Other expenses 12500
Total 92500

ANNEXURE I

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Proposed Sample Size:

Total duration of the project = 10 weeks

Pre-fieldwork (30% of the time) = 3 weeks
Fieldwork (40% of the time) = 4 weeks
Post-fieldwork (30% of the time) = 3 weeks

Number of days for field work = 4*7= 28days

Selection and recruitment = 3 days
Training and pre-testing = 2 + 1=3 days
Contingency = 2 days

Actual time for fieldwork = 20 days

Total Budget of the project = Rs. 1, 00,000

Budget for fieldwork (40%) = Rs. 40,000
Selection and recruitment = Rs. 4,000
Training = Rs. 7,000
Supervisors allowance = Rs. 300*22 = Rs. 6,600
Contingency = Rs. 1,400

Budget for actual fieldwork = Rs. 21,000

Investigators expense per day = Rs. 250

Productivity = 5 interviews
Investigator cost per interview = 250/5= Rs. 50

Proposed sample size = 21000/50 = 420

Investigator works for = 20 days

Investigator will take = 20*5= 100 interviews

Number of investigators = 420/100= 4.2= 4

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(10% of the proposed sample size is taken safety margin for the purpose of
negotiation. Therefore the proposed sample size mentioned to the manager is
375 and not 420)

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