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Assam Agricultural University, Jorhat
Assam Agricultural University is the first institution of its kind in the whole of North-Eastern Region of India. The main goal of this institution is to produce globally competitive human resources in farm sectorand to carry out research in both conventional and frontier areas for production optimization as well as to disseminate the generated technologies as public good for benefitting the food growers/produces and traders involved in the sector while emphasizing on sustainability, equity and overall food security at household level.
Genesis of AAU -
The embryo of the agricultural research in the state of Assam was formed as early as 1897 with the establishment of the Upper Shillong Experimental Farm (now in Meghalaya) just after about a decade of creation of the agricultural department in 1882. However, the seeds of agricultural research in today’s Assam were sown in the dawn of the twentieth century with the establishment of two Rice Experimental Stations, one at Karimganj in Barak valley in 1913 and the other at Titabor in Brahmaputra valley in 1923. Subsequent to these research stations, a number of research stations were established to conduct research on important crops, more specifically, jute, pulses, oilseeds etc. The Assam Agricultural University was established on April 1, 1969 under The Assam Agricultural University Act, 1968’ with the mandate of imparting farm education, conduct research in agriculture and allied sciences and to effectively disseminate technologies so generated. Before establishment of the University, there were altogether 17 research schemes/projects in the state under the Department of Agriculture. By July 1973, all the research projects and 10 experimental farms were transferred by the Government of Assam to the AAU which already inherited the College of Agriculture and its farm at Barbheta, Jorhat and College of Veterinary Sciences at Khanapara, Guwahati.
Subsequently, College of Community Science at Jorhat (1969), College of Fisheries at Raha (1988), Biswanath College of Agriculture at Biswanath Chariali (1988) and Lakhimpur College of Veterinary Science at Joyhing, North Lakhimpur (1988) were established. Presently, the University has three more colleges under its jurisdiction, viz., Sarat Chandra Singha College of Agriculture, Chapar, College of Horticulture, Nalbari & College of Sericulture, Titabar. Similarly, few more regional research stations at Shillongani, Diphu, Gossaigaon, Lakhimpur; and commodity research stations at Kahikuchi, Buralikson, Tinsukia, Kharua, Burnihat and Mandira were added to generate location and crop specific agricultural production packages.
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ThesisItem Open Access FARMERS’ ADOPTION BEHAVIOUR AND FACTORS AFFECTING THEIR ‘WILLINGNESS TO PAY’ (WTP) FOR CLIMATE SMART AGRICULTURE (CSA) IN ASSAM(2019-07) Barman, SundarAgriculture has become a high-risk profession towards climate change and weather variability, which have direct impact on farmers’ socio-economic condition, and at the same time has to face challenge to provide food security for ever increasing population. So, there is a need to study the different aspects of climate smart agriculture. Keeping this in view primarily, the present study entitled ‘Farmers’ Adoption Behaviour and factors affecting their ‘Willingness to Pay’ (WTP) for Climate Smart Agriculture (CSA) in Assam’ was carried out in four districts of Assam namely Dibrugarh, Sonitpur, Dhubri and Cachar in which NICRA programme has been implemented since 2011. The objectives of the study are as follows: 1. To study the degree of farmers’ knowledge and adoption of CSA practices 2. To assess the farmers’ preferences and their ‘Willingness to Pay (WTP) for CSA practices and factors likely to influence thereon 3. To determine farmers’ attitude towards ‘Fee Based Extension Services’ (FBES) 4. To document farmers coping strategies for mitigating effect of climate change and variability. A purposive and proportionate random sampling method was used for selecting 400 farmers as respondents from four NICRA villages of respective districts. Appropriate statistical methods were used for analysis and interpretation of data. The profile analysis of respondents showed that majority of respondents (60%) belonged to age group of 35-50 years with formal educational experiences 6 to 10 years having family size more than 7 members with agriculture as main occupation. The dependency ratio of family was found 64.90 to 304.18 % with average size of land holding as 3.79 ha out of which more than 66 per cent was lowland with average cropping intensity of 135.20 %. The average annual income was Rs.1, 05,000 of which 54 % income came from farm activities. Major proportion of respondents (68 %) had training exposure of 1-3 days with medium level of farm information source relevancy (60 %), market accessibility (55.50%), degree of commercialization (70 %) and degree of innovative proneness (68.75%) with 12-24 years of farm experiences. The findings reveal that overall knowledge on selected CSA practices was of medium level for majority of respondents (69%).The adopters of overall selected practices were 79.85 per cent. The adoption consistency for overall selected CSA practices was of medium level for majority of respondents (58.25%). STVs, INM and IPM were found to be the most preferred and high degree of WTP while low degree of WTP was found for VC and MT. The LMR model showed that adoption consistency, degree of preference and WTP were expressed variation by selected explanatory variables with 23% (R2=0.23), 51% (R2=0.51) and 74%(R2=0.74) respectively. ‘Age’ (X1), ‘dependency ratio of family’ (X3), ‘proportion of low land’ (X4), ‘market accessibility’ (X7) and ‘cropping intensity’ (X9) were found to have positive and significant influence on adoption consistency while dependency ratio of family (X3)’ ‘proportion of low land’ (X4), institutional contact (X6)’, ‘market accessibility’ (X7) degree of commercialization’ (X10) and ‘adoption consistency’ (X13) recorded to have positive but age (X1)’, annual farm income (X5) and ‘farm experience’ (X8) have negative and significant influence on farmers’ degree of preferences. In case of WTP, educational experience’ (X2), ‘market accessibility’ (X7) ‘cropping intensity’ (X9), ‘adoption consistency’ (X13) and ‘degree of preferences to CSA practices’ (X14) were found to have positive while variable ‘age’ (X1) and ‘institutional contact’ (X6) have negative and significant influence on WTP. Perception of farmers about climate change was found complementary with realities as most of the farmers disagree with change of temperature, rainfall over last 20 years. Majority of respondents (54.75 per cent) had unfavorable attitude towards FBES while middle age group with occupation agriculture, agriculture +service and agriculture + wage earner had favourable attitude but medium and large farmers had unfavourable attitude towards FBES. Farmers with low and high institutional contact had favourable attitude but high income group farmers had unfavourable attitude. Farmers’ copping strategies such as ‘transplanting of Bao paddy during May-June instead of normal practice i.e. direct sowing during March-April’, ‘erecting solar electrical wire with low voltage in the boundary of crop cultivation area’ ‘selling of livestock before onset of summer season’ change of cropping sequence rice - rabi vegetables to rice-maize, staggered sowing of seed with high rate, Community seed bank for paddy crop were followed for mitigating adverse effect of climate change. Extension agencies, both public and private should put forward strategic effort to make farmers aware of climate change and its impact on food production, popularizing these technologies need to be taken care of in other similar areas, systematic assessment of other CSA practices available in the research front, different stakeholders (both public and private) in input and output chains should work in convergence mode as a common entity so that farmers get necessary environment for adoption of technologies.ThesisItem Open Access FACTORS AFFECTING RICE-TORIA DOUBLE CROPPING IN UPPER BRAHMAPUTRA VALLEY ZONE OF ASSAM – AN ANALYSIS THROUGH AGRICULTURAL KNOWLEDGE INFORMATION SYSTEM(AAU, Jorhat, 2018-01) Saikia, Shyamolima; Barman, U.The Northeast region of India including Assam is considered as original home of the world’s hottest chilli, Bhut Jolokia (Capsicum chinense). In recent years several varietal types of Bhut Jolokia exhibiting considerable variation in plant, fruit and pungency traits has been observed in the farmers’ field. Therefore, an attempt was made to characterise a few accessions of Bhut Jolokia at morphological, biochemical and DNA level to elucidate the extent and nature of genetic variation. Expression profile of few pungency related genes in Bhut Jolokia was also attempted to detect their possible allelic variation in the Bhut Jolokia accessions. A set of 20 Bhut Jolokia (C. chinense) accessions, three Capsicum annum accessions (Krishna Jolokia, bell pepper and Cherry type) and one C. frutescens accession (Mem Jolokia) were analysed using 35 morphological and biochemical characters. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) for quantitative characters revealed considerable genetic variation among the genotypes. Variability and path analysis identified fruits/ plant, fresh fruit weight and photosynthetic rate as important parameters for improvement. Principal component analysis (PCA) isolated eight principal components each comprising of several characters and accounting for 78.36% of the total variability among the accessions. Several seedling, fruit and physiological characters contributed towards total variability of the population. The PCA plots failed to distinguish Bhut Jolokia accessions into distinct clusters despite sufficient diversity among them. Sixteen characters were identified based on their contribution to PCA, as minimum morphological descriptors for preliminary characterization of Bhut Jolokia genotypes. Population structure analysis separated the accessions into Bhut Jolokia and non Bhut Jolokia populations. Majority of the genotypes had > 80% membership coefficients for each specific group. Only Acc-21 (Cherry type) showed genomic admixture indicating gene flow between Bhut Jolokia and non Bhut Jolokia populations. The genetic diversity studies conducted with the use of 51 SSR markers and 40 gene specific markers exhibited a low inbreeding coefficient (FIS=0.147), thereby indicating high heterozygosity among the genotypes. The overall FST value of 0.432 indicated large genetic differentiation between the populations. AMOVA performed between all lines grouped according to structure indicated 43% variation between populations, 20% variation among individuals within populations and 37% variation was due to variation within individuals. Gene expression analysis of 6 genes of the capsaicinoid biosynthetic pathway exhibited that the Capsaicinoid pathway genes studied showed significantly higher expression in Bhut Jolokia (C. chinense) genotypes while very low expression levels were observed in Bell pepper genotype (low-pungent). Amongst these candidate genes, AMT, Pun1, PAL from Phenylpropanoid pathway and BCAT, KAS and ACL from Fatty acid biosynthetic pathway were found to be up-regulated in pungent genotypes especially in the breaker stage (25-35 DAF) of the fruit development. The variations in the pungency level were found to be associated with changes in the expression level of the genes of the biosynthetic pathway.ThesisItem Open Access A STUDY ON THE EFFECTIVENESS OF SKILL TRAINING OF RURAL YOUTH (S.T.R.Y.) PROGRAMME IMPLEMENTED BY KVKs IN ASSAM(AAU, Jorhat, 2019-07) Das, Darpan Kumar; Borua, S.Economic uplift of a nation depends not only on agriculture but also on the active participation of youths in agriculture. It is imperative to train and develop the youths skillfully that may help transform agriculture into a lucrative entrepreneurial activity. So, introduction of effective skill training programmes in agriculture and allied sectors is of immense necessity for paving the way to a bright future of the youths. The study was conducted in five districts of Assam, viz., Dhemaji, Lakhimpur, Udalguri, Baksa and Dima Hasao in the year 2019 with a view to study the effectiveness of Skill Training of Rural Youth (STRY) programme implemented by the KVKs of Dhemaji, Lakhimpur, Udalguri, Baksa and Karbi Anglong respectively. The study was carried out with a total of 120 respondents by using purposive sampling technique and by taking 80 per cent of the trainees trained under each of the selected KVKs. The data were collected by means of personal interview schedule and through personal observation for critical skills. Statistical tools employed to analyze the data included frequency, percentage, mean, standard deviation, Pearson product moment correlation coefficient, ‘t’test and chi-square test. The findings revealed that majority (49.17%) of the respondents belonged to the age group of 22 to 32 years, with majority (86.67%) being male and most of them (39.17%) had education up to higher secondary level. Majority (69.17%) of the respondents were marginal farmers and annual income for highest percentage of respondents (75%) ranged between Rs. 40,408.02 to Rs. 2,25,988.64. It was found that majority (62.50%, 60.83%, 46.67% and 65.83%) of the respondents had medium level of achievement motivation, learning motivation, motivation to transfer learning and self-efficacy respectively, and 44.17 per cent had high level of economic motivation. The study further revealed that majority (62.50%) of the trained youths had medium level of training effectiveness. A positive and significant relationship was found between effectiveness of trained youths and their education, annual income, operational land holding, achievement motivation, learning motivation, economic motivation, motivation to transfer learning and self-efficacy. Guidelines and methodologies for training under STRY were suggested to be better specified. The guidelines and methodologies for training perceived as important by trainees included demonstration of skills, field visits, methods used for theory and practical sessions, and effective session plan for training sessions/skill teaching. Problems/constraints faced by trainees during and after the training included lack of Government support and benefits, lack of proper study materials and inadequate hands-on training. Suggestions expressed by trainees for improvement of training were provision of loans by Government to practice the skills, incorporation of more number of practical sessions and provision of raw materials needed to practice the skills acquired. The findings revealed that although the STRY programme has been implemented successfully by the concerned KVKs in Assam, there is ample scope to improve the STRY programme in the subsequent phases for the benefit of the rural youths by considering the suggestions given by the trainees.ThesisItem Open Access FACTORS IMPINGING ADOPTION OF INTEGRATED PEST MANAGEMENT PRACTICES BY THE PADDY GROWERS OF UPPER BRAHMAPUTRA VALLEY ZONE OF ASSAM(AAU, Jorhat, 2019-07) Sharma, Patrika; Mishra, P.Rice forms the staple food crop of India and Assam is one of the ten most rice producing states in the country. One way to achieve more benefits and have low input cost in agriculture finds its way in sustainable agriculture that aims to reduce input costs into crop production. Integrated Pest Management is the approach to achieve sustainable agriculture as it integrates all the crop production practices mainly cultural, mechanical, biological and chemical practices for pest management rather than sole reliance on chemical pesticides. In order to reduce the use of hazardous chemical pesticides and to manage the insect/pest/disease attack as well as to increase the crop productivity, Govt of India, Ministry of agriculture, department of Agriculture and Co-operation launched a scheme Strengthening and Modernization of Pest Management (IPM) approach in India in 1991-92. CIPMC, KVKs, District Agricultural Office from DoA, Assam has conducted enormous programmes on Integrated Pest Management for paddy crop throughout the state. However, dependence on synthetic pesticides has not been eliminated from the farmer’s field. Therefore, this study was conducted in Upper Brahmaputra Valley Zone of Assam with a view to identify the factors impinging adoption of IPM practices by the paddy growers, their knowledge level in IPM practices, extent of adoption of IPM practices, effect of innovation characteristics of IPM in its adoption and to analyze obstacles faced by the paddy growers in adoption of IPM practices. A multi-stage sampling design was followed for selection of 280 respondents from 20 villages. Data were collected administering a structured schedule. Relevant statistical tools viz. frequency, percentage, mean, standard deviation, C.V., C.D., Karl Pearson product moment co-efficient of correlation, Multiple regression analysis, ANOVA test were used. The study revealed that majority of the respondents aged between 41- 53years (56.43%), studied upto High School (46.07%) and had membership of at least one organization (70.72%). Most of the farmers had family size of 5-7 members (62.50%), agricultural experience between 16-23 years (62.85%), and in between 4-9.6 years involved in pesticide application (60.71%). A majority of the respondents were semi medium land holders (50.71%) having 2 to 4 ha of land, had annual income of Rs. 95,720-2, 03,280 (58.57%) and 60.00 per cent used to spend Rs 100-390 for pesticides in a year. Attitude towards IPM practices was moderate for 49.28percent and majority of the respondents (63.92 %) had moderate level of economic motivation. 57.5 per cent had moderate level of scientific orientation and more than half (55.35%) of the respondents had moderate level of innovativeness. Majority (95.71%) of the respondents utilised information sources like progressive farmers, neighbours/local farmers and sometimes family members mostly, rather than utilising modern sources of information mobile phones and internets (32.5%). 40.00 per cent of the total respondents attend training regularly whereas field visit was attended occasionally by 69.64 per cent 53.57 per cent had never attended group discussion. The study further revealed that overall knowledge level of paddy growers in IPM practices is medium (52.85%) for most of the respondents. They had great extent of knowledge on the practice of ‘Proper summer ploughing, Trimming of bunds and Destruction of crop residues before transplanting of rice to minimize the insect pest & disease intensity’ (100.00%) followed by ‘Use bird perches for predatory birds against insect pests of rice’ (90.00%) whereas, majority of the respondents (76.78%) did not know about ‘spraying of Trichogramma in 6 different times at 10 days interval starting from 30-35 DAT’ followed by ‘application of Trichogramma as a biocontrol agent against rice stem borer and rice leaf folder’ (69.28%). Extent of adoption of IPM practices was medium (69.28%) and cultural practices were mostly adopted where as biological practices were least adopted. The correlation analysis showed that operational land holding (r = 0.1979**), annual income (r = 0.1979**), attitude towards IPM practices (r = 0.1979**), innovativeness (r = 0.4151**), extension participation (r = 0.2159**) and knowledge level (r = 0.8710**) had positive and significant correlation with extent of adoption of IPM practices. Data pertaining to multiple regression analysis between farmer’s characteristics and adoption of IPM practices showed that Operational land holding (b = 0.080*), Attitude towards IPM practices (b = 0.150*), Economic motivation (b = 0.089*), Scientific orientation (b = 0.029*), Innovativeness (b = 0.044**), Information source utilization (b = 0.373**), Extension participation (b = 0.759*) and Knowledge level (b = 1.652E-05**) of the respondents jointly contributes 59 percent towards variation in extent of adoption of IPM practices. The study also reveals that a huge majority (72.14%) of the respondents perceived IPM as a technology to a moderate level. 57.85 per cent considered it as profitable, 48.21 per cent of the respondents found IPM practices as highly compatible to the culture of the community, another highest percentage of respondent (37.85%) mentioned it as complex system, but 27.85 percent of the respondents found it simple. Further the study shows that 38.21 percent of the respondents felt trying IPM in their paddy may involve some risk as results are only sometimes visible in the field. Limited access to biological inputs, like pheromone traps, bio-pesticides, tricho-cards etc was ranked top among the obstacles faced in adoption of IPM practices as reported by 100.00percent of farmers followed by inability to control / restrict pest for a limited area and lack of collective action within farming community (98.92%) and Insufficient training ranks third as reported by 96.42 per cent of the respondents. Strategies such as strengthening Community Based Approach for collective pest control, developing farmers friendly educational method/appropriate extension approaches, Ensuring the availability of Biological control agents and IPM devices by KVKs, District Agriculture Offices and other non govt organization etc. can be taken up to promote IPM among paddy growers in a effective way.
