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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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ThesisItem Open Access ENTREPRENEURSHIP DEVELOPMENT AMONG THE RURAL WOMEN OF SOUTH DISTRICT OF TRIPURA(Dr.RPCAU, Pusa, 2021) Reang, Sulochana; Singh, Ashok K.Entrepreneurship shows the path to women’s independence, which meets the demand and desire for higher living condition. SHG have paved the door for rural women to achieve economic independence. Its formation have encouraged many rural women who are interested and keen for their financial security to start the business venture, thereby leads to improvement of women welfare. The research was conducted in the South Tripura district of North-eastern state of Tripura. The district was selected purposively due to the fact that it has the highest number of Self Help Group in the state. 2 blocks namely Jolaibari and Satchand were selected purposively based on the SHG membership. Further, two villages were chosen purposively from each block based on the highest number of Self Help Group representatives, thus constituting a total of 4 villages. From each selected village, respondents who were expressed their desire to take up self-employment as a business venture were selected. 30 members were selected from each village as respondents, thus constituting a total of 120 respondents. Majority of the selected women respondents were found to be young (64.16%), married (97.50%), studied up to secondary school (34.16%), SC category (34.16%), medium-sized family (43.33%) with nuclear family type (63.33%). Crop farming was found to be the primary occupation of most of the women and business was their subsidiary occupation. Nearly half (47.50%) of the respondents had small land holdings and more than half of the women (50.83%) respondents fall into the category of medium annual income. Maximum number (87.50%) of the rural women had received financial assistance from NGOs/SHGs and had high mass media participation (51.00%), medium participation in extension activities (70.00%), medium extension contact (71.66%), along with medium cosmopoliteness (48.33%). Most of the rural women fall into the medium level of aspiration (64.16%) and medium economic motivation (63.33%). In the study area, the majority of the rural women (60.83%) had medium entrepreneurial behaviour. The analysis of correlation coefficient between components of entrepreneurial behaviour with their overall entrepreneurial behaviour showed that all the components i.e. innovativeness, decision making ability, risk orientation, scientific orientation , competitiveness, leadership ability, need for independence, achievement motivation, managerial ability, and self-confidence, had a positive and strong association with overall entrepreneurial behaviour of the respondents which found significance at 1% level. Some of the major constraints prevailing were ‘High labor cost’ (60.82) in production and labor constraints, ‘Non-availability of efficient managers’ (74.67) in technical and managerial constraints, ‘Entire loan is not given at a time’ (68.44) in financial constraints, ‘Long distance of the market’ (43.25) is marketing constraints, ‘Lack of leisure time’ (75.60) in personal/general constraints and ‘High taxation’ (73.47) in policy constraint.ThesisItem Open Access STUDY OF LIVELIHOOD SECURITY AND WELL-BEING AMONG FARMERS OF TELANGANA DURING COVID-19(DRPCAU, PUSA, 2021) POOJA, GOTTIMUKKULA SREE; SINGH, ASHOK K.The whole world is currently dealing wit1h a global outbreak of COVID-19. The World Health Organization declared the outbreak a Public Health Emergency of International Concern on 30 January 2020, and a pandemic on 11 March 2020. So, the present study was conducted during the period of emerging pandemic among the farming community of Telangana state during COVID-19. Two districts viz. Rangareddy and Suryapet were purposively selected which are reported with highest positive cases. From each selected block 2 villages were selected randomly. From each village 20 respondents were selected randomly comprising total 160 respondents from the study area. In this way present study was conducted on 160 respondents in 8 villages. “Livelihood Security” of farmers was measured using an Index developed by Lal (2017) following Alfares & Duffuaa (2009) and Sullivan et al.(2006),FAO methodology, based on 7 sub-indicators of Livelihood Security i.e. food security, economic security, health security, educational security, social security, institutional security and infrastructural security. To assess well-being among farmers, scale has been adopted from MH20 scale which was explored and extracted the 7 latent constructs by using exploratory factor analysis and supplemented with WHO-5 index which had been validated “STUDY OF LIVELIHOOD SECURITY AND WELL-BEING AMONG FARMERS OF TELANGANA DURING COVID-19” with 6 steps of methodological pathway. Most of the respondents were found to be middle-aged, having secondary level of education, family size (consisting of 4 or less 4 members) and with medium level of social participation (by being associated with at least two organizations). Agriculture was the main occupation of the respondents and live-stock rearing was subsidiary occupation. The majority of respondents were the large land-holders, having medium annual income. The largest parts of the respondents were having medium exposure to mass-media and medium level of extension contact. The results revealed that majority of respondents were having medium level of aspiration and high level of risk orientation, with almost equal percent of self-confidence. Extent of overall Livelihood security in the study area was found to be 62.80 percent with seven sub-indicators contributing food security (80.80%), economic security (40.40%), health security (62.50%), educational security (50.60%), social security (71.00%), institutional security (61.40%) and infrastructural security (72.90%). The regression analysis of livelihood security index with 14 independent variables concludes that only 7 factors were significant. R2 value being 0.618 indicates that 14 factors were adduced for 61.80% of variance in the livelihood security index with the highest Significant “t value” of 3.909 for educational years of the respondent. By the dint of well-being scale, 30.63 percent of respondents were found to have low well-being, 35.62 percent were with moderate well-being and 33.75 percent of respondents were reported with Good-well-being. Six variables viz. Occupation, Livestock-holding, Annual Family Income, Mass media Exposure, Risk orientation and Social Participation. Livestock-holding and Mass-media exposure were negatively significant at 10% level defining that one percent increase in each decreases the well-being by 15% with odds ratio being 0.85. Females were having 3 times more well-being than males, promulgated by the odds ratio 4.08, indicating that women are mentally stronger during amid epidemic condition. “Increase in labour scarcity and labour costs” was reportedly faced consequence, by most of the respondents (65%) which was followed by “Due to problem in transportation and marketing, the produce (non-paddy grains, cotton, milk, vegetables etc.,) remained unsold”(57.50%). From the overall analysis, we found that only small percentages of farmers were having low livelihood security. Well-being scale result indicated that almost same proportions of respondents were distributed over three strata. Hence programme related increasing well-being should be implemented among farming especially to cope with crisis such as pandemics.ThesisItem Open Access EVALUATION OF EMPOWERMENT OF FARMERS THROUGH DIGITAL INDIA IN BHADRADRI DISTRICT OF TELANGANA(DRPCAU, PUSA, 2021) SANGEETH, DASIKONDA; Lal, S.P.‘Digital India Programme’ was launched on 1st July 2015 with the twin vision to transform India into a digitally empowered society and knowledge economy. This program had the potential to remove the digital gap between rural and urban India. To know the extent of farmers' digital empowerment, the present study entitled “Evaluation of empowerment of farmers through Digital India in Bhadradri district of Telangana” was framed. The study was conducted in Bhadradri district and it was selected purposively based on average population covered under Common Service Centres and Bharat net scheme in which the selected district was first among all the districts comprising of both the schemes and further 2 blocks and six villages were selected randomly. A total of 120 respondents were randomly selected for the final study. 18 farmers each from 2 villages of Dummugudem block of Bhadradri district were selected separately to rank the digital empowerment index indicators. The data were collected by observation, personal interview method, and with the help of a structured interview schedule prepared for the study. Statistical analyses were performed using frequency, percentage, mean, standard deviation, regression, Alfares, and Duffuaa (2009) method and Sullivan et al. (2006) method and a multinomial logistic model were applied to get meaningful results. The study revealed that the majority of respondents belonged to the middle age group. Most of the respondents are small farmers with middle-level education and medium-level social participation, extension contact, and mass media exposure. To measure the digital empowerment, a weightage index was developed based on frequencies of ranks given by 36 progressive farmers in which economic indicator had the highest weightage (95.08) followed by technical competence (83.15), psychological (77.89), and legal (68.06). The mean values of four indicators, i.e., Psychological, Legal, Economic, and Technical indicators were 0.78, 0.71, 0.78, and 0.38, respectively. Among the four indicators, economic indicator was given the highest rank, and the technical competence indicator was given the least rank by the farmers. Overall empowerment was calculated in which most of the respondents had a moderate level of empowerment. 'Multinomial logistic model' was used to study the relationship between independent variables and empowerment level. Age was positively significant at 5% level, and social participation was positively significant at 10% level. It also revealed that a one-unit increase in age can increase the odds of moderate empowerment farmers becoming high empowerment by 24.2%. (odds ratio [OR] 1.242, 95% CI) at 5% level of significance and one unit increase in the social participation can increase the odds of moderate empowerment farmers to become high empowerment by 28.4%. (odds ratio [OR] 1.284, 95% CI) at 10% level of significance. Digital illiteracy was the major push factor for the adoption of digital technologies among the respondents and e-governance was ranked highest by the respondents as the major pull factor for the adoption of digital technologies. The research concludes that among the indicators, the economic indicator was given the highest weightage, and policymakers should focus more on the technical competency aspect as it was deficient when compared to other indicators. The study concluded that focus on social participation may increase digital empowerment & more focus should be given on technical indicators as it was alarmingly deficient.ThesisItem Open Access A STUDY OF INDIGENOUS COMMUNICATION SYSTEM FOR AGRICULTURE AMONG DIFFERENT ETHNIC GROUPS IN DHEMAJI DISTRICT OF ASSAM(DRPCAU, PUSA, 2021) Gogoi, Bidyut Pritom; ANSARI, M.N.Developing countries like India are having latest method of communication, but their effective utilization by people who are less exposed is doubtful. In those rural areas indigenous means of communication still play a vital role in social functioning, maintenance and social change.Many research have been performed on modern media in the past, but very little has been done to study indigenous media in depth. Keeping aforesaid facts in mind, the present study was planned with the following objectives; 1. To identify different traditional folk media in selected ethnic groups. 2. To document various indigenous media related to agriculture in the local community. 3. To analyze the extent of use, popularity and suitability of indigenous media for agriculture. 4. To assess the effectiveness of different traditional folk media. 5. To suggest strategies for use of Indigenous media for agriculture development. In this type of study, the researcher must be familiar with the local language, history, values, and attitudes. Therefore, Dhemaji district of Assam was purposively selected, as the researcher was familiar with the area, local language, history, values, and attitudes. Out of the 5 blocks two blocks viz. “Machkhowa” and “Bordoloni” block was selected based on cultural diversities. The two selected blocks comprises 51 and 201 in habitat villages respectively and only two villages were chosen from each of the two blocks resulting in 4 villages total. The selected villages are viz. “Gohain Bilotia”, “Begenegora”, “Borbam Deori ½” and “Borbam Gaon”. A list of farmers was compiled from each village based on farming and usage of folk media. . Every list had 25 respondents including both male and female, resulting in a total sample size of 100 for the study. Since, some traditional folk media are done solely by women so both male and female respondents were chosen for the study. The research was descriptive in nature, so the information was collected using a standardized interview schedule and a camera to capture and evaluate content, style, and form in relation to the study's goals. The quantitative data was analysed by using statistical technique like frequency, percentage, mean, standard deviation and correlation coefficient. The findings of the study reveals that majority of the respondents were middle age group (36-55), ST categories, engaged in farming, education up to secondary level, small sized land holding, having medium annual income, mixed type house and farming as the sources of income. It was found that the different traditional folk media prevalent among the selected ethnic groups were Folk songs (Bihu, Oi:nitom), Folk dances (Log, Gumrag), Festivals (Bihu, Ali-Aye-Ligang), Folk theatres like Bhaona and different proverbs, idioms and riddles related to agriculture. It was found that majority of the respondents used folk songs, folk dances, proverbs, festivals, fair regularly and it was found popular and effective for agricultural communication. In correlation analysis, it was found that age, education and mass media exposure was found to be positively correlated with use and effectiveness of traditional folk media and highly significant at 5% and 1%. The findings of the present study hold a great potential in the field of communication research as well as for planning and dissemination of need based information among rural families for agricultural development.ThesisItem Open Access STUDY ON EFFECTIVENESS OF ICT BASED AGRO-MET ADVISORY SERVICES IN ADDRESSING INFORMATION NEEDS OF FARMERS IN DARRANG DISTRICT OF ASSAM(DRPCAU, PUSA, 2021) BARUAH, BHANITA; PRAKASH, SATYAWeather plays salient role in agriculture. No aspect of crop growth and development is devoid of weather. From sowing of seed to its growth, development, yield, incidence of pests and diseases, critical stages of water requirements, fertilizer requirement, weather has profound impact on crop. Even the quality of the produce after harvest and in storage depends on weather. Weather aberration may cause physical damage to the crop resulting in economic loss to farmers. The vagaries in weather can‘t be controlled, unlike other inputs and practices in agriculture. Agro-met advisory service holds the capacity to reduce the vulnerability of farmers to extreme weather and climate fluctuations when provided timely to farmers. As climate change is receiving increasing global attention, so does the use of weather related information in the field of agriculture. ICTs (Information and Communication Technology) recently, are considered easy, fast and convenient way to communicate and get prompt answers of respective problems. Incorporation of ICT in agro-met advisory services can help in boosting Indian Agriculture. The present study on effectiveness of agro-met advisory services was conducted in Darrang district of Assam. The district and the state are highly vulnerable to climate change. An ex-post facto research design was used in the study.100 beneficiary farmers of agro-met advisory services of KVK were selected randomly from 2 blocks of Darrang, 25 farmers each from 4 villages. In order to collect data from respondents, a structured interview schedule was prepared. The important statistical measures used to analyze the research data were frequency, percentage, mean, standard deviation, regression and garret ranking. The effectiveness of ICT based agro-met advisory services were measured by timeliness, utility, quality, satisfaction and ease of understanding of the information. Related social, personal and communication variable were taken as independent variable. The study revealed that for the attributes age, annual family income, experience in farming, mass media exposure, extension participation, extension contact, information seeking behavior majority of the respondents were falling under medium level. For rest of the attributes like gender (male dominated), family type (mostly nuclear family), educational status (majority had primary and high school level), social participation (large proportion were member in one organization), land holding (majority were marginal farmer) results were obtained. Among the ICT tools majority of the respondents used mobile phone, television and social media. Majority of the farmers had agro-meteorological information needs regarding precipitation, temperature, timings of various activities and adverse weather alert. It was found that majority of the respondent perceived the timeliness, quality, utility, satisfaction and ease of understanding to be of moderate level. Hence the overall effectiveness of the advisory services was moderate. Regression analysis of the dependent variable with independent variables revealed that three factors, experience in farming, educational qualification and ICT Tools used were found to be positively significant. The R2 value being 0.556 indicated that the predictors of the study embedded 55.6% of variance on the dependent variable i.e. effectiveness of agro-met advisory services and rest 44.4% variance was due to some other factors which were not included in the study. The study indicated that inability to update ICT expertise regularly, lack of updated information and poor network connectivity were the major constraints in the study locale.ThesisItem Open Access TRAINING NEEDS OF SORGHUM PRODUCTION TECHNOLOGY: A STUDY OF GROWERS IN KALABURAGI DISTRICT(DRPCAU, PUSA, 2021) KUMAR, ANIL; Paswan, Arun KumarThe study entitled “Training Needs of Sorghum Production Technology: A Study of Growers in Kalaburagi District”. The study was carried out with specific objectives to measure the training needs of sorghum farmers along with the factors associated with training need among the selected farmers. An attempt was also made to find out the constraints in attaining training need. The present study was carried out in Kalaburagi district of Karnataka. There are ten blocks in Kalaburagi district. Out of twelve blocks, two blocks, namely Sedam and Jewargi, were selected purposively. Further, two villages from each block were chosen following the random sampling technique. Sorghum farmers has been randomly selected from each of the four selected villages were selected constituting a sample of total 80 respondents for the study purposes. The interview technique was used for collection of data with the help of structured interview schedule. The collected data were analyzed with the help of frequency distribution, mean, standard deviation, correlation and regression analysis. The study revealed that, majority of respondents (43.75 percent) were belonged to the middle age group, having middle school level of education (35.00 percent), small size of family (46.25 percent), small size of land holding (45.00),medium level of experience in farming (68.75 percent), medium level of annual income (75.00), medium level of innovation proneness (48.75), medium level of economic motivation (61.25) The study further revealed that most of respondents were not member of no organization(46.25) medium level of extension contact (60.00 percent), medium cropping intensity (41.25 percent) and most of the respondents (52.50 percent) had medium level of mass irrigation potential. The findings revealed that majority of the respondents expressed medium training need and had medium knowledge about recommended package of practices of sorghum cultivation. The most of farmers expressed training need in the areas were doses of pesticide and fungicide, control measures of pest and diseases, recommended doses of fertilizers, marketing, seed treatment, doses of weedicide and recommended varieties among the sub areas of sorghum production technology. The findings indicated that, variables education (0.374) and contact with extension agency (0.291) were shows positive correlation, at 1% level of significance and age (0.279), innovation proneness (0.251), farming experience (0.238), economic motivation (0.269), and knowledge level (0.242) was also showing positive correlation, at 1% level of significance with the ‘training need’ of the farmers. The regression analysis showed that, size of land holding, economic motivation, contact with extension agency and cropping intensity were the most important factors contributing, significantly, towards the ‘training need’ of farmers. The R2 value (0.416) indicated that the set of variables explain 41.64 per cent of the total variability towards dependent variable i.e., training need. Regarding opinion of training programme, findings revealed that in case of venue for training, majority of the respondents were preferred ‘farmer’s field’ as the best place for organizing training programme. The most of the respondents were preferred two days duration training programme is the best. With regards to size of training, “up to 25 farmers” were best number for organizing effective training. Majority of the respondents were opined in “demonstration” as the best method for conducting training. In case of time of training, majority of the respondents suggested to have training “before/onset of sorghum cultivation”. Suggestions for future work include similar studies with large sample size, more independent and dependent variables need to be carried out at other places for verification of the findings.ThesisItem Open Access ENTREPRENEURSHIP DEVELOPMENT AMONG SUGARCANE GROWERS THROUGH JAGGERY PRODUCTION: A STUDY OF BELAGAVI DISTRICT OF KARNATAKA(DRPCAU, PUSA, 2021) HOSAMANI, AKSHAY NARAYAN; ANSARI, M. N.Sugarcane (Saccharum officinarum L.) is important cash crop grown across 120 countries in world. It is providing raw material for several agro based industries for the development of the country after textiles. It commands greater significance due to their remarkable contribution to our nation economy through foreign exchange earnings. Entrepreneurship is necessary for sugarcane industry for socio economic development of rural areas by mobilizing rural resources, generating employment and enhancing income of the farmers. In the rapid growing world, every country tries to achieve high socio economic development for the prosperity of the society and betterment of its people. Rural society is made up of farming people. So, the contribution of farmers in economic activities is very much important for a healthy nation building. For the value addition to sugarcane products, there is need to promote entrepreneurship among farmers and development of small scale agro based industries in the villages. Keeping all these aspects in view, the present study entitled “Entrepreneurship development among sugarcane growers through Jaggery production: A study of Belagavi district of Karnataka” has been undertaken with following specific objectives: 1. To understand the socio-economic, personal and communication attributes of sugarcane growers involved in Jaggery production. 2. To assess the entrepreneurial behaviour of jaggery producers. 3. To find out association between selected independent variables with entrepreneurial behaviour of jaggery producers and 4.To identify the constraints faced by the jaggery producers and to suggest the remedial measures. The study was conducted in the two blocks of Belagavi district of Karnataka state during the year 2020-2021. A total of 90 respondents were randomly selected for the present study. The data were collected by personal interview method and with the help of a structured interview schedule prepared for the study. The study revealed that majority of respondents with socio-economic, personal and communication attributes like age group, family size, farming experience, live-stock holding, annual family income, extension contact, mass media exposure, cosmopoliteness were falling under medium level in study locale. The study also found that majority of the respondents was male category, possess nuclear family and were completed up to secondary school education. Greater significance of respondents was participated in more than one organization and was having medium land holding up to 4-10 ha. The findings also indicated that the majority of jaggery producers had medium level of innovativeness (68.88%), decision making ability (62.22%), risk orientation (67.77%), knowledge on farming experience (50.00%), and information seeking behavior (60.00%), achievement motivation (68.88%), economic motivation (56.66%), leadership ability (65.55%), scientific orientation (58.88%) and management orientation (65.55%). It was also found that majority (71.11%) of jaggery producers had medium level of entrepreneurial behavior. Variables of family size, family type, category, livestock holding had negatively significant and education, occupation, mass media and cosmopoliteness had positively significant association with entrepreneurial behavior of jaggery producers. Non -availability of labours (Rank I), high wages of labours (Rank II), low price (Rank III), exploitation by middle man (Rank IV), lack of technical guidance and high cost of inputs (Rank V) and high interest rate on loan and insufficient repayment time (Rank VI) were the major constraints faced by jaggery producers.ThesisItem Open Access SCOPING ANALYSIS OF VULNERABILITY AND COPING MECHANISMS OF FARMERS IN FLOOD PRONE AREAS OF ASSAM(DRPCAU, PUSA, 2022) BASUMATARY, ALONGBER; BASUMATARY, ALONGBER; Lal, Sudhanand Prasad; Lal, Sudhanand PrasadIndia is an agrarian country but its states are largely affected by natural disasters and among such disaster is Flood. The frequency and intensity of floods have only increased and their effects are aggravated due to changes in climate. Floods have resulted in the loss of lives, property, and huge reserves of tax money. This study has been carried out in the Barpeta and Morigaon districts of Assam to examine the vulnerability and coping mechanisms of farmers who are constantly affected by floods every year. Both the districts were purposively selected according to the report of ISRO. Barpeta was selected as it has the highest cropped area (91380 ha) affected by flood and Morigaon was selected as it has the highest flood inundation percentage area (70.43%). A revenue circle from both districts was selected randomly. A total of eight villages, four each from a revenue circle, and a total of 160 respondents, 20 each from the selected village were taken for investigation through the computer-based research randomizer technique. The vulnerability index was developed by following Analytical Hierarchy Process by Saaty (2008). To know about the use and adoption of different coping mechanisms followed by respondents, a schedule was developed and was divided into 3 broad categories i.e., individual, community, and institution level. Data were collected by the researcher through a personal interview, direct observation methods, and a well-structured interview schedule validated by experts. Collected data were analyzed with the help of descriptive as well as inferential statistical methods: Mean, Range, Standard deviation, Standard Error, Percentage, Frequency, Analytical hierarchy process (AHP), ANOVA, Binomial Logit Regression using Analytical software (Microsoft excel 2007, SPSS version 26). In terms of „extent of vulnerability‟ majority of the respondents (59.37%) were moderately vulnerable followed by less vulnerable households (22.50%) and vulnerable households (18.13 %). While comparing the districts, the Morigaon district was found to be more vulnerable than the Barpeta district with a Mean + SE value of (-0.506 + 0.014) and (0.074 + 0.017) respectively. It was evident that among the respondents, “Availing food grains under social safety net (PDS)” with global priority (GP-0.12) was found to be the most responsible sub-component for adaptive capacity while “Extent of use of Training received” and “Veterinary institutions” with (GP-0.02) each were found to be the least responsible for adaptive capacity. To determine the relationship between independent variables and the vulnerability level, Binary logistic regression model was used. The model was significant at P<0.001 with Nagelkerke R Square value of 0.927 and 96.3% accuracy level. Age, Caste, Housing type, Genuine Indebtedness, and Mass media exposure were found to be negatively significant at P<0.10 and Family type negatively significant at P<0.05 while Experience in farming, Debt source was found to be positively significant at P<0.10 and Operational landholding, Cropping intensity, Dependency ratio, Contact with Extension Personnel were positively significant at P<0.05. An odds ratio of [OR=0.000] for Family type, Housing type indicated that a unit change from nuclear to joint family and from kutcha to semi-pucca to pucca housing structure would decrease the vulnerability of respondents by (100%). One-Way ANOVA was used to compare the coping mechanisms adopted at three different levels. Among the coping mechanisms adopted by the farmers, coping mechanisms adopted at the Community level (.66667) was found to be highest indicating that coping mechanisms employed at the community level are highly adopted and have been more than the other two viz., Individual level (.56303) followed by the Institution level (.49427). Welch test, Brown-Forsythe test were found to be significant at P<0.001 and Dunnet T3 test and was found to be significant at P<0.05. During the time of data collection, some interesting findings were noticed viz., Residents who live in the char areas uses transportable housing structures and also dig up part of their land and uses that dugged soil to heighten their houses. People in villages of the Morigaon district plant a specific banana species (Musa balbisiana colla) vernacularly known as Athiya/Bheemkol in the local language for making makeshift rafts during floods. The practice of growing traditional flood tolerant long duration rice, Bao rice (Deepwater rice) varieties i.e., Kekoabao, Tulsibao, and Negharibao was still followed in Kacharigaon village as climate change adaptive strategies. Women members of households, mainly of Scheduled Tribe (ST) and Scheduled Caste (SC) brew rice wine and do business to earn money to improve the conditions of their families. Increasing mass media exposure, involving the NGO‟s, regular counselling through religious institutions and medical professionals, popularizing the high yielding varieties of commercial crops i.e., Mustard and Toria are the few policies that are suggested from the findings of the study.ThesisItem Open Access GENDER BASED VARIATIONS IN PERCEPTION OF FLOOD IMPACTS: A STUDY IN DARBANGHA DISTRICT OF BIHAR(DRPCAU, PUSA, 2022) RAI, RUBINA; SATPATHY, BINEETAIndia is an agrarian country where many rural men and women rely on agriculture for a living. Among the many challenges confronting Indian agriculture today, increasing climate variability and natural disasters are the most pressing. Reduced agricultural production is one of the most direct ways in which natural disasters have an impact. Floods are the most expensive and widespread natural disasters, causing up to 50,000 deaths and affecting 75 million people worldwide each year. (FAO 2008). The evidence suggests that the effects of flooding are not genderneutral. As a result, various gender groupings may interpret the impact of flood differently, as well as cope with or adapt to its effects in different ways. Analysis of gender perception of flood impacts is a prerequisite for assessing their adaptation decisions and for avoiding gender-blind rehabilitation policies and programmes that fail to include the gendered responsibilities of both men and women farmers. Besides, the fact that the natural disasters have a gendered impact it is critical to understand how men and women perceive and interpret natural disasters so as to devise and advise on effective adaptation strategies that will secure their livelihoods. With this background, this study entitled “Gender based variations in perception of flood impacts: A study in Darbangha district of Bihar” has been taken up with the objective to study the gender centric perception of impact of flood viz. - socio economic, psychological and environmental and the gender centric adaptation strategies in the locale of study. The investigation was conducted in the state of Bihar. Out of 38 districts in Bihar, Darbangha was selected purposively for this research study as it tops the list of the districts which are most severely affected by flood in Bihar. Hanumannagar and Baheri blocks were selected purposively among the 18 blocks in Darbangha district. Two villages were selected from each block, Godhaila and Uchauli from Hnaumannagar block and Jhakra and Aadabon from Baheri block. So a total of 4 villages were selected for the study. From each of the four villages, 30 respondents were selected (15 men and 15 women), thus making total sample size as 120. The findings revealed that most of the women farmers in the study area belonged to young age group while most of the men farmers were from middle and old age category. Majority of the women were illiterate while most of the men had an education level up to higher secondary and college level which indicates the education disparity among men and women farmers of the study area. Majority of the women belonged to scheduled caste while most men were from general caste category. Majority of both women and men farmers had medium level of information seeking behaviour, exposure to mass media, risk orientation, social participation, and extension contact in the study area. Only a small percentage of women farmers had regular access to mobile phones in the study area whereas more than half of the men farmers used mobile phones regularly as a mass media source. More number of women farmers fell in the low income category as compared to men farmers. Majority of the respondents practiced farming as their primary occupation. Both men and women farmers surveyed had marginal land holdings with women occupying a large majority as compared to men farmers. Goat was seen to be a common livestock holding among women while cow of local breed was popular among the men farmers. The respondents in the study area did not possess more than 2 livestock. In the context of men and women farmers‟ perception about the socio economic, psychological and environmental impact of flood, it can be concluded that majority of them had medium level of perception with women having slightly higher perception of socio economic and psychological impact of flood as compared to men whereas more percentage of men had high perception of environmental impact of flood as opposed to women. The findings of the study revealed that selling livestock, cultivating smaller area than usual and changing planting date were the three prime farm-based adaptation strategy opted by women farmers whereas men resorted to selling of livestock, farm diversification and change in cropping pattern. As for non-farm based adaptation, the three strategies women adopted were using their saved money, borrowing money from friends and relatives and less consumption or changing food habits while men opted for stocking of food grains, borrowing money from friends/relatives and using saved money. Factors like age, household headship, decision making and social participation had positively significant relationship with women‟s perception of psychological impact of flood. With respect to men farmers, age and extension contact had a negatively significant relationship with perception of psychological impact of flood while family size had high positively significant relationship. The results further indicated that education and annual income had a positive correlation with men‟s perception of environmental impact of flood whereas age had a positive correlation with perception of environmental impact of flood in case of women. Annual income and extension contact had negatively significant relationship with men‟s perception of socio economic impact of flood while social cohesiveness was found to be negatively correlated with women‟s perception of socio economic impact of flood.
