The manufacture of products or goods required material as the first basic element. These materials generally fall in to categories. These categories are direct materials and indirect materials. The materials used in the course of manufacture which enters into and becomes part of the product. Metals in the manufacture of fans, boilers, automobiles, aeroplans; wood in manufacture of furniture, silk, ribbon and leather band used in making a hat, cloth in tailoring garments, Clay in the manufacturing of bricks, leather in the manufacture of shoes, wheat used in milling flour are called direct material.
Direct material forms an integral part of the finished product and can be directly identified or included in computing the cost of such product. In other words, it is the material which can be directly measured and charged to the cost of the order or product being manufactured without requiring excessive and uneconomical details for such measurements and identification.
The manual of the machinery Builder's society (now called Machinery and Allied products Institution or M.A.P.I.) defines direct material as "material which can be specifically charged to production orders or to any class or type of product and which forms a part of the finished product, also boxes and containers made specifically there for". Direct materials are also called productive materials, raw materials, raw stock, stores and only materials without any description title.
Direct material forms an integral part of the finished product and can be directly identified or included in computing the cost of such product. In other words, it is the material which can be directly measured and charged to the cost of the order or product being manufactured without requiring excessive and uneconomical details for such measurements and identification.
The manual of the machinery Builder's society (now called Machinery and Allied products Institution or M.A.P.I.) defines direct material as "material which can be specifically charged to production orders or to any class or type of product and which forms a part of the finished product, also boxes and containers made specifically there for". Direct materials are also called productive materials, raw materials, raw stock, stores and only materials without any description title.
