Abstract:
The Rice milling industry is the largest agro-based industry in Sri Lanka. It involves
converting raw paddy to edible form for consumption. Rice mills in the Ampara
district are operating in both small and large economies of scale. However, the
evidence shows that the number of operating small-size rice mills has declined in
this district. Therefore, the present study identified the challenges faced by
small-scale rice millers. The study targeted continuously operating small-scale rice
mills in six division secretariats namely Nintavur (41/51), Kalmunai (9/11),
Addalaichenai (10/13), Sammanthurai (18/22), Karaithivu (10/12) and, Damana
(12/15) in the Ampara district, and was selected using a proportionate sampling
technique based on the number of operating small-scale rice mills in a particular
region. In total 100 small-scale rice mill owners were inquired about the challenges
faced during milling, marketing, and purchasing paddy. Administrating a pretested
questionnaire data was collected physically from each rice mill owner and analyzed
according to the frequency distribution using the statistical software SPSS (ver.25).
Results indicate that small-scale rice millers in the Ampara district face difficulties
in paddy purchasing, milling, and marketing of rice. Most of the rice millers faced
interrupted electricity supply and higher electricity costs during the paddy milling
process. After milling, credit sales (70%) and higher competition (50%) with large-scale rice mills were encountered as prominent marketing problems. Further, rice
price fluctuation and an unstable market (45%) were the major barriers to rice
marketing. The study indicates that the non-competitive market structure
established by large-scale rice millers should be empirically addressed in order to
take pre
