Assessment of role effectiveness of farmers’ advisory committee (FAC) and organizational functioning of ‘ATMA’ project in Gurdaspur district of Punjab - an overview

The present study was undertaken to investigate the role effectiveness of Farmers’ Advisory Committee (FAC) under the Agricultural Technology Management Agency (ATMA) project in Gurdaspur district of Punjab. All the extension functionaries and block level officers were found instrumental in solving the farm related problems of the respondents and this was increased to 80.39 percent during the post project period. The composition of FAC members, and the frequency and duration of meetings were not found satisfactory as per the stipulated norms of ATMA. It was disgusting to note that only 29.60 per cent members could be enrolled in FAC vis-à-vis stipulated quota as per ATMA norms in the study area. The average attendance of FAC members in the meetings was 78.38 percent. Most of them attended 20–40 meetings only out of a total of 60 meetings held in a year in the five study blocks. All of them quoted personal/family compulsions and non-payment of DA/TA as reasons for not attending meetings. They however had good knowledge of FAC norms about such matters. The organizational functioning was reported as good, but still improvement was needed to be made for making ATMA project more effective in future.