Adapting to Climate Change: Millet Export Strategies for the Future

Abstract

As the world grapples with climate change and food security challenges, millets emerge as a promising solution due to their superior water and nutrient use efficiency, climate resilience, and high nutritional value. Despite India's position as the leading global producer, accounting for 41% of the world’s millets, their prominence has declined post-Green Revolution, which prioritized rice, wheat, and maize. Recognizing the potential of millets, the UN declared 2023 as the International Year of Millets to promote their health and environmental benefits. This study examines India's millet export prospects, emphasizing trade policy interventions to enhance market demand and economic growth. Utilizing secondary data from sources like the WITS database, ITC trade map, CEPII database, and FAOSTAT, this research employs the quantitative research methods like, Revealed Comparative Advantage (RCA) and Revealed Symmetric Comparative Advantage metrics to analyse India's millet export competitiveness. To estimate the export potential, the Poisson Pseudo Maximum Likelihood (PPML) estimator for the gravity model is used, addressing zero trade values and heteroskedasticity in the data. The model analyses export data from 150 countries for 2014-2021. Findings indicate that India, the largest millet producer with an 18.1% global production share in 2022, leads in both area and production. India, the top millet exporter, shows significant comparative advantage, particularly alongside Ukraine. The gravity model reveals that distance, exchange rates, and the absence of free trade agreements negatively impact millet exports, while population, bilateral trade flows, common religion, ethnicity, and WTO membership of importing countries positively influence exports. Notably, India has untapped export potential in 130 out of 159 countries studied. India's millet production offers significant export potential. Strategic trade policies can boost demand, overcome barriers, and enhance global food security while driving economic growth, leveraging millets' resilience and nutrition.