Production and Marketing Situations of Local Fruit Wine and Whisky in the Upper North

Abstract

This research aimed to indicate the production and marketing situations of local fruit wine and whisky business run by the rural entrepreneurs. Data on business situation, production, technology and marketing of local fruit wine and whisky from 50 purposively selected entrepreneurs in six provinces of the upper north had then be employed.

The results of the study showed that most of the entrepreneurs were small business and operated in form of partnership with few experience or no experience. There were many kinds of fruits and herbs used as main raw materials to produce various types of local wines and whiskies. Most of the entrepreneurs used simple processing technique, equipments and packaging material and form. These practices directly and inversely affected consumers’ hygiene and safety. The marketing strategies were almost defensive in nature aimed at local market and tourist attractive. The average production costs were 46.05 and 53.16 baht/bottle of fruit wine and herbal wine respectively. On the other hand, the averaged production cost of local whisky was 16.77 baht/bottle. About 97 percent of these production costs were the variable costs. The computed rate of net returns was more than 65 percent when the products were sold at the retail level.

Development of production and marketing of the local fruit wine and whisky grew slowly because lack of entrepreneurs’ knowledge on good business operation, production techniques and marketing. At the same time, access to adequate operating credit was another problem faced by these entrepreneurs. To improve these constraints, the authors recommended the establishment of information center specialized on the production and marketing of local fruit wine and whisky. Provision of credit was also necessary. Moreover, entrepreneurs should also intend to improve their product quality, product hygiene and safety, and to build up brand names of the products in order to compete in the competitive market environment.