Farmers’ Knowledge and Practices about Agrochemical Use on Selected Crops in Jammu & Kashmir state
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Date
2019-09
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Sher-e-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology of Jammu, Jammu
Abstract
The present study entitled “Farmers’ Knowledge and Practices about Agrochemical Use on Selected Crops in Jammu & Kashmir state” was undertaken to analyse the agrochemical us and plant protection measures adopted by the rice-wheat and vegetable cultivating farmers in sub-tropics of Jammu region. The study was conducted by employing non-experimental descriptive research design. For analysing the knowledge and adoption of agro-chemicals, Jammu, Samba and Kathua districts in case of rice-wheat cultivation and Jammu district in case of vegetable cultivation were selected purposively. A sample of 370 respondents: 270 rice-wheat farmers from Jammu, Samba and Kathua districts and 100vegetable cultivating farmers from Jammu district, were selected for the study. Twointerview schedules, one for rice-wheat cultivating farmers and one for vegetable cultivating farmers were prepared. In addition a knowledge test was constructed in order to analyse the knowledge of the respondent farmers about various aspects of agro-chemical use and plant protection practices.
The results of the study depict that agro-chemical and plant protection practices were adopted by the rice-wheat and vegetable farmers keeping in view their socio-personal, bio-physical conditions, communication behaviour and perception of agro-chemical and plant protection practices. The respondent rice-wheat and vegetable farmers had medium level of education, high level of farming experience but poor extension contact with scientists of SKUAST-Jammu/KVK and the rice-wheat and vegetable cultivating farmers were matching on all of the socio-personal parameters. Majority of the respondent rice-wheat and vegetable farmers had medium level of knowledge of agro-chemicals and plant protection measures. The respondent rice-wheat and vegetable farmers had less knowledge about natural enemies, seed treating chemicals, correct dosage of seed treatment chemicals, colour identification band on pesticide labels, banned pesticides, residual effects of pesticides and alternative pest management practices. Farmers also had very low level knowledge about the precautionary measures to be adopted while spraying pesticides, site specific application of pesticides, personal protective equipment (PPE) (like gloves, facemask, glasses etc.) while handling pesticides and proper disposal of empty pesticide containers. Interestingly, the knowledge of harmful effects of pesticides was comparatively high in the study area. The perception of the rice-wheat and vegetable farmers about agro-chemical use, on the other hand, was different as the rice-wheat farmers prefer chemical method of managing weeds in rice and wheat as compared to vegetable farmers who prefer manual method of managing weeds.
Adoption of SKUAST-Jammu developed varieties was zero in rice, wheat and vegetable crops in the study area and very few farmers adopted varieties recommended by SKUAST-Jammu. In vegetable crops, farmers are mostly cultivating varieties developed by private seed companies. Adoption of agro-chemicals in rice, wheat and vegetables was moderate to high in the study area. Farmers applied higher dosages of urea and DAP in rice and wheat and lower dosages of MOP and ZnSo4. On the contrary, the respondent vegetable farmers applied higher dosages of urea, DAP and MOP in vegetables. Regarding pesticides, farmers mainly applied herbicides in rice and wheat and some amount of insecticides in wheat which was low. In case of vegetables, farmers mainly managed weeds manually and applied insecticides to manage insect pest attacks in different vegetable crops. The adoption of seed treatment in rice, wheat and vegetable was also low and field EIQ in rice, wheat and vegetables was comparatively lower than previous studies by researchers in sub-tropics of Jammu.
From the major findings on the factors affecting adoption of agro-chemicals in rice, wheat and vegetables, bio-physical and communication behaviour were the major factors impacting the decision to use or not to use chemical fertilizers. It can be inferred that, the decision of a farmer to adopt agro-chemicals is largely affected by the respondents contact with diverse sources of information and farmers possessing larger operational land holdings and irrigated land. Socio-personal factors like age and education impacted the adoption of MOP and herbicide in rice and non-adoption of personal-protective equipment (PPE) by rice-wheat and vegetable cultivating farmers.
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