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Dr. Rajendra Prasad Central Agricultural University, Pusa

In the imperial Gazetteer of India 1878, Pusa was recorded as a government estate of about 1350 acres in Darbhanba. It was acquired by East India Company for running a stud farm to supply better breed of horses mainly for the army. Frequent incidence of glanders disease (swelling of glands), mostly affecting the valuable imported bloodstock made the civil veterinary department to shift the entire stock out of Pusa. A British tobacco concern Beg Sutherland & co. got the estate on lease but it also left in 1897 abandoning the government estate of Pusa. Lord Mayo, The Viceroy and Governor General, had been repeatedly trying to get through his proposal for setting up a directorate general of Agriculture that would take care of the soil and its productivity, formulate newer techniques of cultivation, improve the quality of seeds and livestock and also arrange for imparting agricultural education. The government of India had invited a British expert. Dr. J. A. Voelcker who had submitted as report on the development of Indian agriculture. As a follow-up action, three experts in different fields were appointed for the first time during 1885 to 1895 namely, agricultural chemist (Dr. J. W. Leafer), cryptogamic botanist (Dr. R. A. Butler) and entomologist (Dr. H. Maxwell Lefroy) with headquarters at Dehradun (U.P.) in the forest Research Institute complex. Surprisingly, until now Pusa, which was destined to become the centre of agricultural revolution in the country, was lying as before an abandoned government estate. In 1898. Lord Curzon took over as the viceroy. A widely traveled person and an administrator, he salvaged out the earlier proposal and got London’s approval for the appointment of the inspector General of Agriculture to which the first incumbent Mr. J. Mollison (Dy. Director of Agriculture, Bombay) joined in 1901 with headquarters at Nagpur The then government of Bengal had mooted in 1902 a proposal to the centre for setting up a model cattle farm for improving the dilapidated condition of the livestock at Pusa estate where plenty of land, water and feed would be available, and with Mr. Mollison’s support this was accepted in principle. Around Pusa, there were many British planters and also an indigo research centre Dalsing Sarai (near Pusa). Mr. Mollison’s visits to this mini British kingdom and his strong recommendations. In favour of Pusa as the most ideal place for the Bengal government project obviously caught the attention for the viceroy.

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20222
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Subject: Agricultural Extension Education × End date: 2022 × Start date: 2022 ×
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    ThesisItemOpen Access
    A COMPARATIVE STUDY OF INDIGENOUS TECHNICAL KNOWLEDGE AND IMPROVED GRAIN STORAGE SYSTEM IN BIHAR
    (Dr.RPCAU, Pusa, 2022) KUMAR, NIRALA; Singh, A.K.
    The country has diverse agro climatic conditions with different agro-ecosystem across the regions or states. In the state of Bihar, the main source of livelihood is agriculture and farmers need to store their farm produce for next season sowing as well as to meet their round the year requirements. Hence, a range of storage structures (from traditional to improved storage) are being used by the farm community as per their convenience and utility of these structures. However, till date there is no systematic study ever been made by researchers with respect to the different storage system used by rural people in Bihar. Only a few fragmentary information is available and a gap of comprehensive detail on storage structures has been identified since a long time. Keeping this fact in mind, the present investigation was conceptualized with the following specific objectives; 1. To know the socio-economic and personal characteristics of selected respondents. 2. To examine the Indigenous Technical Knowledge (ITK) used by the respondents for storage of their food grain. 3. To study the extent of adoption of improved storage system of food grain. 4. To examine the comparative perception of respondents about ITK system and improved system of storage in Bihar. 5. To suggest the suitable extension strategies for popularization of the improved storage system in the study area in order to safeguard the losses of food grain. This study was carried out in the state of Bihar in the districts viz. Samastipur, Begusarai, Bhagalpur and Banka where University of Illinois Urban-Champaign (USA) is working to popularize the scientific method of storage system. Out of these four selected districts two blocks were covered from each of district such as, Tajpur and Shivajee Nagar in Samastipur, Chhorahi and Mansurchak in Begusarai, Kharik and Goradih in Bhagalpur, Chanan and Rajaun in Banka district. Further, from the selected 8 blocks, equal number of villages was identified for the purpose of study based on the largest number of household of different farming groups. While selecting the beneficiaries and non-beneficiaries care will be the taken to draw the sample from different categories of farmers based on their land holding. The beneficiaries farmers were those who received the training along with hermetic bag through the U.S. project while, non-beneficiaries farmers were those farmers who were residing in the same village but they did not receive neither the training nor hermetic bag for storage. Thus, total sample of the study were 320 in which (160) beneficiaries respondents and (160) non- beneficiaries respondents. Personal interview schedule was carefully constructed and developed for data collection in order to obtain the appropriate response from respondents in a face-to-face environment. To arrive at a relevant result and conclusion, the data was subjected to statistical analysis using frequency, standard deviation, mean, z-test, and percentage. The results of the study reveals that maximum of the respondents were from middle age group, backward caste, marginal land holder, agriculture as main occupation, joint family system, having secondary and higher secondary education, low income, low cropped area, medium level of contact with extension agencies, medium level of risk orientation, medium level of value orientation and high level of progressiveness. The study further reveals that 86.25 percent of rice and 71.90 per cent of pulses produced were stored and kept under the metal storage system through the process of ITK respectively. It was found that 28.75% of beneficiary‟s respondents were having most favourable perception toward ITK storage system. In z-test analysis it was seen that the mean difference value of ITK storage system was found much more higher (25.64%) as compared to the Improved storage system i.e. (12.58%). It was observed that enhancing the durability and maintaining the quality of grain was perceived as problems by about at 89.37% selected beneficiaries and in the case of non-beneficiaries farmers high cost of storage system 62.50 % was found as the main problem followed by non- availability of Hermetic bag. The result further suggested that training on rodent control and management was one of the important issues indicating 64.37% in beneficiaries group followed by 61.25% of non-beneficiaries farmers. During the study one of the most important suggestion obtained from the selected farmers that there should be adequate availability of improved storage system at low and subsidized cost. The findings of the study holds a great scope for the Government, policy makers, administrators to consider the constraints as faced by the farmers regarding the availability and use of improved grain storage systems and also to make a concerted efforts in an integrated manner to resource the constraints as indicated through the process of investigation.
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    ThesisItemOpen Access
    ANALYZING THE CONTRIBUTION OF INFORMATION COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGIES (ICTS) IN MITIGATING CLIMATE CHANGE AMONGST FARMERS: A STUDY OF EASTERN DRY ZONE OF KARNATAKA
    (Dr.RPCAU, Pusa, 2022) N, NARENDRA V; PRAKASH, SATYA
    A long-term shift in the climate's condition is referred to as "climate change." It is predicted to have negative consequences, including an increase in the severity and frequency of climatic variables such as drought, flood, and storms. The conditions for rural Indians, especially smallholder farmers, will unquestionably get worse as a result. Therefore, it is essential to adapt to and mitigate climate change. Agricultural extension is a vital source of knowledge in rural regions, even though it is not always successful and efficient. Radio, mobile phones, video, social media, and other Information Communication Technologies (ICTs) have long been recognized as being essential to the spread of agricultural knowledge; more recently, their potential to aid in climate change awareness and adaptation have attracted significant interest. So, the present study was conducted among the farming community of Karnataka state. Two districts viz. Bengaluru Rural and Chikkaballapura were purposively selected based on historical rainfall uncertainties, agricultural susceptibility to climate change, and other factors. From each district two blocks were purposively drawn based on criteria that took into account the block with the largest geographic area and population. From each selected block5 villages were selected randomly. From each village 12 respondents were selected randomly comprising total 240 respondents from the study area. The results show that farmers had comparatively better access and used ICTs, especially the mobile, TV, and internet services than common service centres and personal computers and remaining tools in the Chikkaballapura and Bengaluru Rural districts. Electricity served as the ICTs' primary power source and they were very well understood the print media content when it is available in the local language. Mobile applications like Varuna Mitra, Meghasandesh and Sidilu are the popular ones in both districts but in the case of Bengaluru Rural is better access to these applications as compared to Chikkaballapura district. The affordability of ICTs is felt by both districts as they can afford all the ICTs which are relatively less in the case of personal computer. The common service centres are relatively less accessed in both districts as compared to other ICTs. It was found that most respondents in both districts were generally aware of climate change. The climate change awareness index revealed that some people who believed they were aware about climate change actually weren't aware or had a low level of knowledge. Particularly, the respondents' knowledge of problems with regard to the causes, mitigation, and global aspects of climate change was low. The main source of climate-related information in both districts was found to be mobile followed by TV but comparatively more response in Bengaluru Rural than in Chikkaballapura. The constraint has been categorized into three categories based on Garrates score, social constraints, economic constraints and technical constraints. „Cautious about accessing technology' and Lack of awareness about advanced ICTs used for accessing climate change related information as the second rank in social constraints. Economic constraints, High call rates in mobile calling as first and high charges on data and validity packs as the second rank. Technical constraints, Lack of adequate skills to use ICT and Limited availability of computers and community centres as first and second rank. The suggestions as given by the farmers of both districts the response captured as mutually inclusive and then ranked based on the weightage given to each statement. It is found to be the statement „Training should be given to the farmers for proper use of ICTs in mitigating and adopting climate change and „Government should initiate Awareness programmes about available new ICTs tools and its applications‟. The relationship and strength of the relationship between the independent variable and dependent variable has been revealed by correlation and multiple regression methods. The variables like caste, sex, family size and preparedness for adoption as found to be no relationship with use of ICT tools in Bengaluru Rural and The variables like caste, sex, size of land holding and change resistance were found to be no relationship with use of ICT tools in Chikkaballapura district. Strength of influence revealed by regression method it is found to be the variables like education, farming experience, family size, size of land holding, credit orientation and mass media participation had strong influence use of ICT tools in Bengaluru Rural and the variables like education, size of land holding, credit orientation, mass media participation, innovative proneness, extension agency contact, risk orientation and information seeking behaviour found to be strong influence on use of ICT tools in Chikkaballapura district.