Designing and testing of need-based community radio programme on integrated pest management in Nainital district of Uttarakhand
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Date
2018-06
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G.B. Pant University of Agriculture and Technology, Pantnagar - 263145 (Uttarakhand)
Abstract
Agricultural extension has an important role in agricultural development, but over the years, extension services have been criticized both for failing to reach the majority of farmers and to communicate successfully with those that fall within the range. Efforts to strengthen agricultural extension have focused on innovations in communication to improve the points of interaction between researchers, extension agents and farmers to promote a greater sharing of information. In this context, community radio offers both the reach and the relevance to its listeners when the programmes are designed in a community-based and participatory manner. The strength of community radio as an extension tool is widely regarded to lie in its ability to reach illiterate farmers and provide them with information relating to all aspects of agricultural technologies in a language they understand. Present study was conducted in Nainital district of Uttarakhand. Four villages Dina, Parma, Jairam and Shantinagar were selected through simple random sampling. Total 120 respondents were selected from four villages in proportion to their population using probability proportionate to size sampling. Interview schedule, questionnaire, focused group discussion and knowledge test were used for data collection. Statistical technique such as frequency, percentage, mean, weighted mean score, standard deviation, t-test and correlation coefficient were used to analyze the data for meaningful interpretation. The findings of the study revealed that majority of respondents (64.17 %) were of middle age group. None of the respondent was illiterate and maximum (36.67 %) were educated up to high school level. It was found that almost all the respondents (95%) were having marginal landholding yet majority of them (62.5 %) had medium annual income might be because most of them (62.15 %) were engaged in agriculture & other subsidiary occupation. Majority of respondents (62.5 % and 79.17 %) had medium achievement
motivation and scientific orientation respectively. It was also found that majority of respondents (80 %) had medium mass-media exposure and 73.33 per cent had medium information seeking behaviour. Among various information sources, personal localite sources were mostly preferred by most of the respondents and more than half of the respondents had no membership in any social organization. Through need assessment of respondents various topics were selected based on their level of awareness regarding three broad issues viz., concept of IPM, Non-Chemical methods of pest management and Chemical method of pest-control. Community radio programmes were then designed according to the need of the respondents and by seeking their participation. It was found that at 0.01 level of significance post-test score of respondents was significantly higher than pre-test score following which it was concluded that community radio programme is significantly effective in terms of gain in knowledge. Education, achievement motivation, scientific orientation, information seeking behaviour and social participation were found to have positive and significant relationship with gain in knowledge. The study elaborates the role of community radio in agricultural development by disseminating need-based information and bringing significant change in the awareness and knowledge of farmers.
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