Establishing dialogue with farm women of Uttarakhand hills: A communication strategy

The role of women is of crucial importance in rural economy in hill areas of Uttarakhand. Except ploughing, almost all the farm activities are carried out by women. Women's work and knowledge is the back-bone of production and productivity of hill agriculture. But, there is wide gap between farm operations in practice and recommended research-based technical know-how of hill agriculture.

The present study is an analysis of gap between scientific recommendations related to hill agriculture and existing agricultural operations in practice. The study was conducted in Chamoli district of the state. There are nine Community Development Blocks in the district. One village from each CD Block was selected for the study. Thus total nine villages were studied. Data were collected with the help of Focus Group Discussions, Key Informant Technique and In-depth Interviews. The existing agricultural extension system of the state in general and of the district in particular was analysed on the basis of data gathered from secondary sources.

It was found that women's contribution in various farming activities is higher than men's, both with respect to number of tasks performed and in terms of time spent but they are using traditional agricultural practices due to their negligible access to the latest developments in hill agriculture. However, women are playing central role in hill agriculture; but access to agricultural knowledge is skewed towards male. The state requires gender sensitive treatment to its agricultural extension system.