GROWTH, PRICE INSTABILITY AND FLEXIBILITY OF MAJOR CROPS IN BANGLADESH

The key concern of this research is to assess the growth, fluctuation and price flexibility of Aus, Aman, Boro, wheat and jute crops during the last two decades of the twentieth century. Real prices of all the crops have been falling significantly during the study period. The price instability was higher than area and yield instability for all these crops studied. The extent of real price fluctuations was higher relative to area, production and yield fluctuation of all the crops. It was observed that supply of Aus, wheat and jute production played insignificant role to determine their own post-harvest prices, but Boro, Aman and Aus production had significant role on the prices of crops of Aus, wheat and jute through significant cross effects. On the other hand, Aman and Boro production had significant influence on post-harvest price determination of these rice varieties as revealed by price flexibility co-efficients. So price policy measures cannot be taken on a single crop basis in Bangladesh