Adoption of Improved Small Ruminant Practices by the Pastoralists of Jammu and Kashmir State
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Date
2019-02-14
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Sher-e-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology of Jammu (J&K)
Abstract
There are nearly 200 million pastoralists in the world generating income, where conventional farming is limited or not possible. Pastoralists are the people who derive more than 50 percent of their income from livestock and over 90 percent of animal consumption from natural pasture or browse. Pastoralists mainly depend on three resources livestock, pasture and water and for this purpose they migrate and this is the only way for they can survive and sustain the ecological balance of nature. The pastoralists in Jammu and Kashmir still follow their traditional occupation of rearing animals and their condition has still remained unchanged. In this context a study was conducted in the Jammu and Kashmir state entitled “Adoption of Improved Small Ruminant Practices by the Pastoralists of Jammu and Kashmir State” with a view to document the knowledge and adoption of improved small ruminant practices. The data was collected from 400 pastoralists belonging to Kathua, Jammu, Anantnag and Leh district of Jammu and Kashmir with the help of structured interview schedule containing selected dependent and independent variables, through personal interview technique. Majority of the pastoralists were middle aged, having poor education, engaged in caste occupation and were having marginal landholding and possessed medium herd size of 58 small animals. Further, most of the respondents had medium family size, with average of 6 family members. The social participation and mass media exposure of majority of the respondents were medium. They had poor extension contact. The income of the majority of respondents from livestock rearing was ` 59290 per year and were having 31 years of average experience in livestock rearing. Pastoralists fared well in terms of economic motivation. However, majority had semi-nomadic pastoral system. The marketing system was rather limited. None of the pastoralists had obtained any formal training in improved small ruminant rearing practices. Majority of respondents (57.75%) were having medium level of knowledge (49.86%), whereas, 24 percent had low knowledge (49.27%) and only 18.25 percent respondents had high knowledge level (56.46%). Positive significant association of knowledge with education, occupation, landholding, herd size, social participation, extension contact, mass media exposure, income from livestock rearing, economic motivation, and marketing system was observed. However, negative significant association of knowledge with pastoral system was observed. Majority of respondents (47.75%) were having medium adoption (46.60%) followed by low adoption (39.01%) of small ruminant practices by 32.25 percent of respondents. The respondents of the high adoption level (55.30%) constituted 20 percent of the total. Positive significant association between adoption and education, occupation, land holding, social participation, extension contact, mass media exposure, income from livestock rearing, and economic motivation was observed, while, negative significant association of adoption with pastoral and marketing system was observed. Constraints like increasing input costs makes it difficult to achieve profitability was the most serious constraint perceived by the pastoralists followed by lack of good quality breedable animals and non-availability of veterinary surgeons. However, inadequate knowledge to detect signs of heat in animals was the least serious constraint perceived by the pastoralists.
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