JAC Board Class 7 Social Science Notes Civics Chapter 8 A Shirt in the Market
→ A chain of markets links the producer of cotton to the buyer of the shirt in the supermarket. Buying and selling takes place at every step in the chain.
→ A Cotton Farmer in Kurnool:
- Cultivation of cotton is a very tough and difficult job. Cultivation of cotton is very expensive and requires high levels of inputs such as fertilisers and pesticides.
- The farmers have to bear heavy expenses on account of these. The small farmers need to borrow money to meet these expenses.
- Local traders were giving loans to farmers and in return they were buying their cottons from them at cheaper rates. They were very clever and making good amount of money.
→ The Cloth Market of Erode
- Different varieties of cloth are sold in Erode’s bi-weekly cloth market in Tamil Nadu.
- It is one of the largest cloth markets in the world.
- Cloth that is made by weavers in the villages around is also brought in the market for sale. Offices of cloth merchants are present in the market who buy this cloth. Other traders from many south Indian towns also come and purchase cloth in this market.
- On market days, weavers bring cloth that has been made on order from the merchant. These merchants supply cloth on order to garment manufacturers and exporters around the country. Merchants purchase the yam and give instructions and directions to the weavers about the kind of cloth that is to be made.
→ Putting-out System – Weavers Producing Cloth at Home
- The merchant distributes and hand out the work among the weavers based on the orders he has received for cloth. The merchant give yam to the weavers and in turn the weavers supply him the cloth.
- Two advantages are there for the weavers. They do not have to spend their money on purchase of yam. Second, the problem of selling the finished cloth is taken care of.
- But this dependence on the merchants for raw materials and markets means that the merchants has a lot of power. They give orders for what is to be made and they pay a very low price for making the cloth.
- The weaver never know for whom they are making the cloth or at what price it will be sold. At the cloth market, the merchants sell the cloth to the garment factories. The market works in favour of the merchants most of the time.
- Weavers invest all their savings or borrow money at high interest rates to buy looms. He cannot work alone so he takes the help
of another adult family member. They work very hard and earn very nominal amount. - The arrangement between the merchant and the weavers is an example of putting-out system where the merchant supplies the raw material and receives the finished product. It is prevalent in the weaving industry in most regions of India.
→ The Garment Exporting Factory Near Delhi
- The Erode merchant supplies the cotton cloth produced by the weavers to a garment exporting factory near Delhi. The garment exporting factory will use the cloth to make shirts.
- The shirts will be exported to foreign buyers who are from the US and Europe who run a chain of stores.
- They do business on their own term and conditions. They demand the lowest prices from the supplier and set high standards for quality of production and timely delivery. Any defects or delay in delivery is dealt with strictly. Hence, the exporter tries his best to meet the conditions.
- The exporters having these conditions and pressures in turn cut the costs of weavers and maximize their own profit and supply the garment to foreign buyers at cheap rates.
→ The Shirt in the United States
The big businessperson who bought the shirts from the garment exporters in Delhi earn a huge amount of profit. Although, he spent some amount on advertising, storage, etc.
→ Who are the Gainers in the Market?
There were people who made profits in the market and there were some who did not gain as much from this buying and selling. Despite they have been toiled very hard, they earned very little.
→ Market and Equality
- Democracy is also about getting a fair wage in the market.
- The foreign businessperson made maximum profits in the market But, the garment exporter made only moderate profits. Whereas, file workers earned so less at the garment export factory that are barely enough to cover their day- to-day needs. Similarly, the small cotton former and tiie weaver at Erode put in long hours ofhard work but they did not get a lair price in the market for what they produced. The merchants or traders are somewhere in between.
- Mostly the rich and the powerful that get the maximum earnings from the market. These are the people who have money and own the factories, the large shops, large land holdings, etc. The poor have to depend on the rich and the powerful for different things. They have to depend for loans, for raw materials and marketing of their goods and most often for employment.
- Due to this dependency and inequality, the poor people are exploited in the market.
- To overcome these situations, cooperatives of producers are formed and ensures that laws are followed strictly.