McCormick+Schmitz Handbook for value chain research on - PACA

Sales per <strong>chain</strong>
Total annual sales are a good indicator of the importance of the <strong>chain</strong>s we intend to study.
Export data, i.e. sales to <strong>for</strong>eign markets, are usually easier to obtain than data on
domestic sales. All national governments have offices which collect and publish trade
statistics. In most cases you will find that the data are sufficiently disaggregated in terms
of destination and product. A problem arises when you want local (rather than national)
export data: <strong>for</strong> example, how much did the garment industry of Ahmedabad export?
Here you have several choices: request special tabulation from the national office, obtain
data from the relevant state or local government, or request help of the local business
association. The latter is probably the best starting point as it usually keeps such data
anyway. The association is also the body to advise you on how to obtain data on sales to
the domestic market.
If you find that the secondary data are either not available or too unreliable, you have two
options. Either you conduct your own survey, obtaining the data from the (sample of)
firms directly. Or you obtain estimates of the relative size or ranking of the <strong>chain</strong>s
through interviews with respondents in key positions (e.g. head of transport company,
association officials, traders).
Number of enterprises
At first sight this may seem the easiest kind of data to obtain but you will soon find that
you need to draw on a number of sources, first because some of the enterprises may not be
registered and second, because we want enterprise numbers <strong>for</strong> the different stages and
types of <strong>chain</strong>. Our aim is to collect data <strong>for</strong> the kind of <strong>chain</strong> map represented by Figure
9.2.
Let us start with the garment manufacturers. Both the Government Statistical Office and
the local/sectoral Business Association are likely to have a register. Work out which
register is more complete and up to date. Perhaps you need to work with a combination
of the two. In order to make these judgements, enlist the help of somebody who has had
recent contact with many manufacturers (a consultant, an input supplier, an association
official). With the help of one or several of these “experts” you can “allocate” the
manufacturers to the various <strong>chain</strong>s. The criterion is which is their main market? (Or if
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