Information Needs of Tribal Tomato Growers of Vadodara District

Tomato is one of the most important protective foods because of its special nutritive value. It is one of the most versatile vegetable with wide usage in Indian culinary tradition. Tomatoes are used for soup, pickles, ketchup, puree, sauces and in many other ways. It is also used as a salad vegetable. Tomato has very few competitors in the value addition chain of processing. Tomato cultivation requires enough care right from nursery raising to post harvesting operations. Necessary package of practices must be followed for the better yield. Looking to this, the present investigation was carried out to study the information needs of tribal tomato growers of Vadodara district. The result of this study revealed that information on fertilizer application rank first followed by pest and disease management. The Study also indicated that more than two-third of the tomato growers (70.00 per cent) were fell under medium group, while 19.16 and 10.84 per cent of the tomato growers were categorized under high and low groups of information needs, respectively.