1Ph.D. Scholar, Division of Agriculture Extension Education, FoASher-e-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology of Jammu-180009, J&K
2Associate Professor, Division of Agriculture Extension Education, FoASher-e-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology of Jammu-180009, J&K
3Professor, Division of Agriculture Extension Education, FoASher-e-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology of Jammu-180009, J&K
4Ph.D. Scholar, Division of Agriculture Extension Education, FoASher-e-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology of Jammu-180009, J&K
5Ph.D. Scholar, Division of Agriculture Extension Education, FoASher-e-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology of Jammu-180009, J&K
Farm mechanization plays a critical role in increasing agricultural productivity. The availability of farm power per unit area (kW/ha) has been considered as one of the parameters for expressing level of mechanization. Farm machinery use depends upon the farm power available for various tractive and stationary operations. At present the availability of farm power is 0.78 kW/ha in Jammu and Kashmir which is very low as compared to the National average which is 2.02 kW/ha. Drought animals continue to provide major tractive power for field operations. It indicates that animal power still plays a major role in sources of farm power, so there is a much need for further adoption of farm machineries. Even though farm mechanization helps farmers in various ways like to mitigate the labour shortage, reduces drudgery etc. yet it is not adopted on a large scale. Hence the farmers need to have access to agricultural machinery at a reasonable cost in order to complete their farm operations timely and increase their cropping intensity also which is possible with the adoption of farm machineries on a large scale. Hence the study was conducted to find the adoption of farm machinery through Farm Machinery Banks (FMBs) under Sub Mission in Agricultural Mechanization (SMAM) in Jammu division of Jammu and Kashmir. The present study was conducted in Jammu, Doda and Samba districts of Jammu & Kashmir because of having maximum number of FMBs (11 in no.). Multi stage sampling plan was followed for the selection of ultimate respondents. Each FMB comprises of 8-10 members and all FMB adopted villages were selected. Hence making the sample size of 98 FMB adopted farmers. Whereas in case of Non-FMB members, they were selected randomly from each FMB adopted village and making the sample size of 44 members. Thereby making a total sample size of 142 respondents. The result of the study showed that Farm machinery adopted by the farmers through Farm Machinery Banks were cultivator, disc harrow, rotavator (43%), power tiller (55%), power weeder, leveller (27%), earth auger, seed drill (47%), seed cum fertilizer drill, happy seeder, knapsack sprayer, spray pump, water pump, maize thresher, reaper, reaper cum binder, wood cutter, brush cutter, chaff cutter, trolley, wheat cleaner and water tank.
Farm machinery banks, Drudgery reduction, Rotavator, Happy seeder, Power tiller
