Participation and Constraints Faced by Farm Women of Watershed Programmes in Bundelkhand Region of Central India

The watershed programme is primarily a land based programme, which is increasingly being focused on water, with its main objective being to enhance agricultural and grassland productivity through increased in-situ moisture conservation and productive irrigation for socio-economic development of rural people and its success in soil and water conservation often requires a combination of various measures and needs to be integrated with in a comprehensive agricultural management system. Hence, in order to gain the potential ecological and economic benefits from soil and water conservation, policy and funding support are necessary. The region of Bundelkhand in central India (240-260 30’ N latitude and 780 10’-800 30’ E longitude) comprises seven districts of Uttar Pradesh and six districts of Madhya Pradesh states. Out of total 7.04 m ha geographical area of Bundelkhand region, 3.01 m. ha. falls in the State of Uttar Pradesh (Gupta, 1981) and remaining 4.01 m. ha in Madhya Pradesh (BDA, 1986). Three fourth area of the region depends on rainfall for its agriculture. Hence, there is a need for participation of farm women in successful watershed management programmes in the region

Post-adoption behaviour of farmers towards soil and water conservation technologies of watershed management in India

AbstractThe Indian Institute of Soil and Water Conservation (IISWC) and its Research Centres have developed many successful model watershed projects in India in the past and implemented many Soil and Water Conservation (SWC) technologies for sustainable watershed management. While many evaluation studies were conducted on these projects in the past, there has been no assessment of the post-adoption status of the SWC technologies over a longer period. It was imperative to appraise the behaviour of the farmers with regard to the continuance or discontinuance of the technologies adopted, diffusion or infusion that took place and technological gaps that occurred in due course of time in the post watershed programme. Therefore, it was realized that the post-adoption behaviour of beneficiary farmers who have adopted different soil and water conservation technologies for watershed management projects should be studied in detail. The research study was initiated in 2012 as a core project at Vasad as the lead Centre along with IISWC headquarter Dehradun, and Centres Agra, Bellary, Chandigarh, Datia, Kota & Ooty, with the specific objectives of the study to measure the extent of post-adoption behaviour (continued-adoption, discontinuance, technological gap, diffusion and infusion) of farmers towards the adopted SWC technologies of watershed management. In the present study various indices regarding continued adoption, dis-adoption (discontinuance), technological gap, diffusion, infusion regarding soil and water conservation technologies for watershed management were developed for measurement of post-adoption behaviour of farmers. It was revealed that a little less than three-fourth (73%) of SWC technologies continued to be adopted and more than one-fourth (27%) were discontinued by farmers. Out of the total continue adopted SWC technologies by farmers, a little less than one-fifth (19%) of technologies continued to be adopted with a technological gap. More than one-fourth (28%) of SWC technologies were also diffused to other farmers’ fields in nearby villages and on an average 1.2 technologies were also infused into the farmers׳ fields from outside by their own efforts in the watersheds developed by the IISWC and its Centres

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Not AvailableMobile phone, owing to its aordability, accessibility and widespread network is emerging as a preferred digital tool for information dissemination for smallholder farmers. However, the adoption rates are found to be higher when supplemented with non-digital approaches.Not Availabl

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Not AvailableResource conservation programmes are implemented mostly on watershed basis where people’s participation is an inbuilt institutional mechanism for ensuring the sustenance and success. Capacity building is pre-requisite for active involvement of villagers based on their prioritized needs. ICAR-Indian Institute of Soil and Water Conservation, Dehradun is working as a nodal agency for organizing training programmes for field functionaries involved in watershed development and management. Present study is an effort to identify, assess and prioritize training needs of the Watershed Development Team (WDT) members and farmers along with office bearers of the watershed committees. In total, 118 farmer respondents of high and mid hills, 36 from lower hills and plains and 35 WDT members were taken for the study. Responses were recorded on five point continuum in form of ranks, viz I, II, III, IV and V. Frequency for each rank was obtained through matrix analysis. Rank Based Quotient (RBQ) for each rank of individual need (sub component) was calculated separately and was summed up to get the final RBQ score. Likewise, it was done for all the sub components of watershed and overall priority ranking was computed on the basis of final RBQ scores. Though, almost all the respondents were from the watershed areas and most of them were office bearers of the WDT committees but their perception in terms of training needs was reflected inclined to personal gains, not towards common cause or community based activities. Equity and transparency were the high priority training needs in case of farmers but for WDT members, these were the least prioritized needs.Not Availabl

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Not AvailableIn remote hilly regions of the country, small land holders are still not able to make a remunerative living out of farming owing to poor access to markets. Farmers in the remote hilly region of Chakrata area in Dehradun district of Uttarakhand have evolved a unique type of localized marketing mechanism, which is successful and sustainable.Not Availabl

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Not AvailableThe Government of India in its annual budget 2016-17 set a policy target of doubling farmers’ income by 2022. Agriculture sustains livelihood for more than half of the India’s total population. Doubling farmers’ income in such a short period is an overwhelming task for decision makers, scientists and policy makers. Doubling farmers’ income is possible through increasing total output and better price realization in market, reduction in production costs, diversification of product, efficient post-harvest management, value addition, etc. In this paper, efforts have been made to detail issues, challenges and strategies to achieve the target of doubling farmer’s income. Specific strategies suggested for achieving the target of doubling farmers’ income were market management, agricultural input management, risk management and agricultural extension strategies.Not Availabl

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Not AvailableThe Indian Institute of Soil and Water Conservation (IISWC) and its Research Centres have developed many watersheds in the country and implemented large number of mechanical Soil and Water Conservation (SWC) technologies for sustainable management of them. Though many evaluation studies were conducted on these watershed projects in the past, assessment of diffusion of the SWC technologies has not been done yet. This research study was conducted during 2012-15, with the specific objective to measure the extent of diffusion of mechanical SWC technologies and also ascertain the factors responsible for their diffusion. Indices of diffusion of SWC technologies from 37 watersheds revealed that more than one-fourth (27.82%) of SWC technologies were diffused from farmers’ fields in watersheds. Technology-wise data revealed that 37.72% farmers diffused bunding, land leveling diffused from 24.73% farmers’ fields, check dam technology diffused from 12.98% farmers’ fields, recharge filter diffused from 9.4% farmers’ fields, terracing diffused from 9% farmers’ fields, gully plug diffused from 5.33% farmers’ fields, and pond technology diffused from 3.38% farmers’ fields of watersheds developed by IISWC and its Centres in the country. The important SWC technologies diffused from watersheds were bunding, land leveling, check dam, recharge filter, terracing, gully plug technology and water pond due to the reasons of reduction in runoff & soil loss, moisture conservation, ground water recharge, and increase in agricultural production.Not Availabl

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Not AvailableLakhan Singh, Rajesh Bishnoi, Bankey Bihari, S. S. Shrimali, Darshan Kadam and Raman Jeet Singh (2020). Effectiveness of Mobile-based Advisory to Farmers in Soil and Water Conservation. In book ‘Agricultural Extension: Socio-economic Imperatives’ edited by A.K. Singh, Randhir Singh, P. Adhiguru, R.N. Padaria, R. Roy Burman and Alka Arora published by Indian Council of Agricultural Research, New Delhi, pp 41-45.ICA

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Not AvailableThe important soil quality indicators were investigated under different land use systems namely, sal forest, agroforestry, rainfed cropland and irrigated cropland to provide base line data for future research in lower north western Himalayan region. The soil properties such as soil depth, texture, organic carbon, total N, available P, available K, CEC and soil pH were investigated for each land use system to assess relative soil quality index (RSQI). The study revealed that there were significant differences in soil quality parameters under different land use systems. The study further revealed that soil quality index (SQI) values varied from 337 in sal forest to 257 in rainfed cropland inDungakhet village indicating the superiority of forest land use system in terms of maintaining greater SQI than other land-use systems. Similar trend was also observed in the other site of the study area. Analysis of data on RSQI revealed that the soil quality index for rainfed cropland was 23.74% lower in Dungakhet and 19.88% lower in Pasauli than the reference sal forest. In general, intensive tillage practices have degraded most of the important soil quality indicators. Therefore, reducing the intensive tillage practices and use of integrated inorganic and organic fertilizers could replenish the degraded soil quality for sustainable agricultural production in the study area.Not Availabl