Assessment of the level of knowledge and training needs of potato growing tribal farmers of Meghalaya

The present study was conducted in ten villages falling under six potato growing regions of East Khasi Hills district of Meghalaya during 2009–2010. A semi structured interview schedule was administered on 150 randomly selected farmers from these villages. Findings of the study showed that regarding overall practices of potato cultivation a majority (71.3%) of potato farmers had high level of knowledge followed by 16.6 per cent and 12.0 per cent of potato farmers who had medium and low level of knowledge respectively. Highest training need (mean score 3.34) was felt for plant protection measures followed by manures and fertilizer application, and land preparation and planting respectively. The variables education, occupation, social participation, sources of irrigation, annual income were found to be negatively and significantly correlated with the training needs of the respondents, while land holding under potato cultivation was found to have positive and significant correlation with the training need.