Information seeking behaviour of farmers in Aligarh District of Uttar Pradesh

A study was conducted in Aligarh district of Uttar Pradesh, India to assess the information-seeking behaviour of the farmers. There are twelve blocks in the district. Five villages from each block were selected randomly. From each selected village ten farmers were selected randomly for data collection. The total sample size of the study was 600 farmers of district Aligarh. A structured interview schedule was used to collect the data. Findings of the study reveal that maximum number of farmers were educated up to high school and intermediate (30.17 % each), having land up to two hectares with irrigation facility (72.99 %). Family size of most of the farmers (58.33 %) was medium (5 to 8 members). Major sources of agricultural information for farmers were fellow farmers, friends/relatives, shopkeepers of agricultural inputs, officers/extension functionaries of the department of agriculture, and television. While kisan mobile advisory service (mkisan), kisan call centre, newspapers, internet, scientists of Agricultural Research Station, and representatives of NGOs were the least used information sources. Few farmers participated in the extension activities organised by different extension service providers in the district. Participation in Krishak Gosthies (farmers’ meetings) occupied the first position in rank order of extent of participation in extension activities followed by Kisan Melas (farmers’ fairs), farmers’ training programmes, exposure visits, and field demonstrations, respectively. The current study suggests the need for strengthening the personal cosmopolite sources of agricultural information and training of farmers in the identification and utilization of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) based sources of agricultural information. There is also a need to enhance the number of extension activities and the farmers who have never participated must be encouraged to participate in extension activities.