Perception of Farmers towards Mobile Agricultural Extension Services in Tamil Nadu

The study assessed farmers’ perception towards Mobile Agricultural Extension Services in Tamil Nadu. A purposive and simple random sampling technique was used to select 120 farmers from the two districts of the state-Pudukottai and Ramanathapuram. Data generated were analyzed using descriptive statistics-means, standard deviation and frequencies. Correlation analyses were also used. Results showed that farmers in the area had medium level of social participation, extension agency contact, information seeking behavior, decision making behaviour, awareness on ICT tools and services and possession of modern electronic gadgets. Farmers in the area had medium level of perception towards mobile agricultural extension service delivery. Mass media exposure (X8), informationseeking behavior (X10) and awareness on ICT tools and services (X13) had a positive significant relationship at 1% level of significance with the number of ICTs farmers in the area had access to mobile agricultural extension services. ICT education should be built into the extension delivery package of extension agents to farmers particularly the use of the mobile phone since this is capable of eliminating series of wasteful trips made by farmers to get at extension workers and vice versa. Extension service delivery needs to be beefed up to bring about improved income that will enable farmers to increase their purchasing power.