FACTORS INFLUENCING ADOPTION OF SOME IMPROVED ANIMAL HUSBANDRY PRACTICES OF DAIRYING IN ANAND AND VADODARA DISTRICTS OF GUJARAT STATE
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Date
2002
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AAU, Anand
Abstract
The dairy farming plays a pivotal role in the economy of our country. It helps in augmenting food supply, generating employment and raising nutritional level. The major advantage of dairy farming is its minimum land dependency and resource flexibility. It is a major source of income to major segment to rural betterment in small and marginal farmers, at the same time it is also characterized with risk and uncertainty. It is therefore, use of modem inputs and adoption of new technology of animal husbandry are undoubtedly more important in increasing dairy farm productivity. There is a considerable gap between present animal husbandry practices of the dairy farmers and available scientific animal husbandry development so far. Out of these, which technology are known and adopted by its real users of different classes is a matter of question. Hence, to analyze the existing extent of knowledge and adoption of the dairy farmers, the present study on "FACTORS INFLUENCING ADOPTION OF SOME IMPROVED ANIMAL HUSBANDRY PRACTICES OF DAIRYING IN ANAND AND VADODARA DISTRICTS OF GUJARAT STATE" was undertaken. OBJECTIVES: 1. To study the profile of dairy farmers of Anand and Vadodara districts of Gujarat. 2. To study the extent of knowledge of dairy farmers regarding improved practices of animal husbandry. 3 To study the extent of adoption of improved practices of animal husbandry by dairy farmers. 4. To find out relationship between extent of knowledge of dairy farmers regarding animal husbandry practices and dairy farmers profile. 5. To find out relationship between extent of adoption of improved animal husbandry practices and profile of dairy farmers. 6. To know the problems faced by dairy farmers in adoption of modem practices of animal husbandry, and 7 To seek suggestions to overcome problems/limitations of dairy farmers in adoption of modem practices of animal husbandry. The present study was conducted in randomly selected sixteen villages of Anand and Vadodara districts. A sample of 172 dairy farmers having milch animals was selected for the study. The data were collected with the help of "interview schedule" by conducting personal interview. For the measurement of independent and dependent variables, appropriate scales developed and adopted by other research workers were used with due modifications. The statistical tools used for the analysis of data were percentage. mean, standard deviation, correlation coefficient, stepwise regression and path analysis. The important findings of the study are summarized as under; 1. Majority of the dairy farmers (76.74 per cent) had middle age, secondary and higher secondary level of education (58.72 per cent), higher caste (61.63 per cent), organizational participation in dairy co-operative society (57.56 per cent), medium level of mass media exposure (43.60 per cent), medium to high level of extension contact (77.33 per cent), marginal, small and medium dairy farmers had less than four ha. of land holding (72.09 per cent) and low to medium level of herd size (67.50 per cent). 2. The average parity of dairy animals of dairy farmers was observed 3.67 ± 0.08 while, the average age at first calving in indigenous cows, crossbred cows and buffaloes was 47 months, 34 months and 46 months, respectively. Whereas average peak milk yield was 9.03 ± 0.39 litres and average annual expenditure for medical treatment was Rs. 254.30 per animal. The average number of earner, dependent and total members of family was 2.0, 4.0 and 6.0 respectively. Great majority of dairy farmers (94.77 per cent) were dependent on crop farming, dairying and other occupation, and majority (87.57 per cent) of them had increased their total income upto 10 to 25 per cent due to adoption of dairy farming. 3. Majority of the dairy farmers (69.18 per cent) had medium to high level of economic motivation, medium to high level of scientific orientation (79.07 per cent), medium to high level of planning orientation (62.79 per cent), medium to high level of production orientation (70.93 per cent), high level of market orientation (53.49 per cent), medium to high level of competition orientation (77.91 per cent), medium to high level of supervision on dairy production (74.42 per cent) and low level of orientation towards development of skill in farm workers (55.23 per cent). 4. Majority of the dairy farmers had medium to high level of knowledge (68.60 per cent) and adoption (81.98 per cent) regarding improved animal husbandry practices. 5. Continuous rate of adoption regarding improved animal husbandry practices viz. reproductive practices was observed in between 72.10 to 91.86 per cent, nutritional practices in between 59.88 to 95.93 per cent, managemental practices between 52.91 to 98.84 per cent, disease control practices between 32.56 to 97.09 per cent and marketing practices between 32.56 to 100.00 per cent by dairy farmers. 6. Great majority of the dairy farmers of Anand district had perception of majority of the activities carried out by Amul Dairy. 7. The variables namely extension contact, animal possession, economic motivation, scientific orientation, planning orientation, production orientation, market orientation, management orientation, competition orientation, orientation towards development of skill in farm workers, supervision on dairy production and adoption of animal husbandry practices had positive significant relationship with the knowledge of dairy farmers, while land holding and total number of occupation had negative and significant correlationship with their knowledge regarding animal husbandry practices 8. The variables namely extension contact, animal possession, economic motivation, scientific orientation, planning orientation, production orientation, market orientation, management orientation, competition orientation, orientation towards development of skill in farm workers, supervision on dairy production and knowledge were positively and significantly correlated with adoption, while land holding and total number of occupation were negatively and significantly correlated with their adoption regarding improved practices of animal husbandry. 9. The variables namely management orientation, milk yield, competition orientation, land holding, market orientation, extension contact and total number of milch animals jointly contributed 67.24 per cent of total variation in the knowledge of improved animal husbandry practices of dairying. 10. Four variables viz. knowledge, production orientation, orientation towards development of skill in farm workers and total number of animal together contributed 63.13 per cent of total variation in the adoption of improved animal husbandry practices of dairying. 11. Variables viz. market orientation, planning orientation, production orientation, competition orientation, extension contact, total animal possession, scientific orientation and orientation towards development of skill in farm workers exhibited positive direct effect, whereas management orientation had maximum total indirect effect and substantial indirect effect on knowledge regarding improved animal husbandry practices of dairying. 12. Variables namely managemental practices, nutritional practices, disease control practices, marketing practices, reproductive practices, planning orientation, market orientation, production orientation, orientation towards development of skill in farm workers, competition orientation and economic motivation, exhibited positive direct effect, while knowledge had maximum positive total indirect effect and management practices had highest substantial indirect effect on adoption regarding improved animal husbandry practices of dairying. 13. High cost of byre construction, lack of knowledge of recommended managemental practices, unavailability of reasonable and quality green fodder round the year, unavailability of comfortable and stress-free housing during summer season, lack of knowledge of viability of cattle/buffalo, difficulty to store milk during summer season and timely vaccination against diseases in the animals were the major problems faced by dairy farmers in adoption of improved animal husbandry practices. 14. Arrangement of regular visit of veterinary doctor and extension specialist, cooperative society should have the facility of preservation of vaccines and semen, atleast five members of a dairy co-operative society should be trained to solve the problems of animal husbandry, regular training should be provided to farmers to improve their knowledge for better adoption and loan/subsidy facilities should be made available for construction of cattle shed and purchase of dairy animals were the important suggestions given by the dairy farmers to improve level of adoption of modem practices of animal husbandry.
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Keywords
LIVESTOCK PRODUCTION, A STUDY