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Central Agricultural University, College of Post Graduate Studies in Agricultural Sciences, Umiam

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20201
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Subject: Agricultural Extension × Author: Devi, Mayanglambam Victoria × Thesis Type: Ph.D ×
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    ThesisItemOpen Access
    Social simulation on assimilation of climate smart agricultural practices in North Eastern Hill Region of India
    (College of Post Graduate Studies in Agricultural Sciences, CAU-Imphal, Umiam, 2020-10) Devi, Mayanglambam Victoria; Singh, Rajkumar Josmee
    Agriculture is in peril owing to negative impacts and consequences of Climate Change (CC) in terms of physical, contextual and societal facets. Adaptation to CC in agricultural and associated sectors is a major current and future challenge for the North Eastern Hills States (NEHS) of our country. The hill state like Meghalaya faced low in crop production owed to severe drought (Singh et al., 2013) and significantly declined in annual rainfall (Feroze et al., 2018). Despite the benefits & advantage of Climate Smart Agricultural (CSA) Practices, assimilation rate is still very low by tribal farmers of NEHS of India (Aryal et al., 2018). A scientific inquiry to cognize the assimilation of CSA Practices by farmers in NEHS of India was ordained with the following three research objectives viz.,(1) To identify and assess Climate Smart Agricultural practices with respect to climate change vulnerable districts of the Tropical, Sub-Tropical and Temperate Agro-Climatic Zones (ACZs); (2) To simulate the assimilation of identified CSA Practices by farmers of climate change vulnerable districts; and (3) To develop suitable extension strategies for assimilating identified CSA Practices by farmers. The scientific inquiry was conducted in the three states namely, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur and Meghalaya representing Tropical, Sub-Tropical and Temperate ACZs respectively and from these corresponding ACZs, the most CC vulnerable districts viz., the East Siang, the Bishnupur and the East Khasi Hills were selected for study. By following cluster sampling, seventeen villages were finalized for the study and consequently 257 respondents were identified through proportionate random sampling. The study uncovered that majority of the respondents belonged to low category w.r.t the following variables viz., ‘Land Holding’, ‘Annual Income’, ‘Farming Experience’, ‘Extension Contact’, ‘Access to Climate Change Adaptation & Mitigation Services’, ‘Training on CSA Practices’, ‘Climate Change Adaptation Intention’, ‘Climate Change Mitigation’, ‘Livelihood Sustainability’ and ‘Innovativeness of CSA’. However, highest percentage of respondents were lofted in medium categories apropos of variables viz., ‘Mass Media Exposure’, ‘Exposure to Long Term Stresses or Shocks’, ‘Awareness on Consequences of Climate change’, ‘Risk Perception’, ‘Knowledge on CSA’, ‘Climate Risk Management’, ‘Utilization of Credit’, ‘Scientific Orientation’ & ‘Resilience to Climate Change in Agriculture’. The research could unveil 9 Nutrient Smart, 6 Soil Smart, 7 Water Smart, 5 Energy Smart, 5 Carbon Smart, and 6 Knowledge Smart CSA Practices. In the discourse, while performing System Dynamics (SD) simulation at the best fit by considering ‘Potential Assimilators’ and ‘Assimilators’ as ‘Stocks’, ‘Assimilation Rate’ as ‘Flow’, ‘Extension Services of Extension Specialists’ as Balancing Loop Identifier and ‘Farmers to Farmers Extension’ as Reinforcing Loop Identifier with 9 parameter variables and 2 dynamic variables by keeping 5 years as span of simulation, it could be revealed that the Assimilation Gap of CSA Practices by farmers of East Siang, Bishnupur and East Khasi Hills district were 56.75%, 89.47% and 70.99%, respectively. On the administration of the SWOT-AHP hybrid analysis, it could be uncovered that ‘Crop and Livestock Diversification due to existence of different Agro-Climatic Zones’; ‘Overly long Return on Investment span of CSA technologies on adaptation and mitigation of CC consequences’; ‘Successful market-aligned supply chain infrastructure from farm to fork’; and ‘Food insecurity and unsustainable livelihood due to adverse impact of CC on agriculture and associated enterprises’ were the most principal Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats with inconsistency ratio of 0.09, 0.02, 0.03 and 0.08 respectively. By performing AHP, it could be reported that 81.30% of the experts inclined upon the CSA systems to be effectively disseminated and consequently be assimilated by farmers against 18.70% of the experts. Keeping into consideration the rationalities on the output of SWOT-AHP, strategies for assimilating identified CSA Practices by farmers in seven domains have been developed. The research concludes that assimilation gap of CSA Practices by farmers of NEHS at present is alarmingly very high despite of the availability on basket of potential CSA Practices. Thence, the identified strategies are sincerely suggested for bridging the assimilation gap.