Information Management Behaviour of Farmers in Agricultural Extension Service Systems in Telangana
A. Uday Kumar *
Department of Agricultural Extension Education, College of Agriculture, Rajendranagar, PJTAU, Hyderabad, Telangana, India.
B. Savitha
Department of Agricultural Extension Education, College of Agriculture, Rajendranagar, PJTAU, Hyderabad, Telangana, India.
M. Jagan Mohan Reddy
Extension Education Institute, Hyderabad, India.
G. E. Ch. Vidyasagar
PJTAU, Rajendranagar, Hyderabad, India.
D. Srinivasa Chary
Department of Statistics and Mathematics, College of Agriculture, Rajendranagar, PJTAU, Hyderabad, Telangana, India.
*Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Abstract
Agriculture is an information-intensive sector in which timely, reliable and relevant information plays an important role in improving farmers’ decision-making and farm management practices. The study aimed to assess and compare the information management behaviour of farmers associated with public, private and NGO agricultural extension service systems in Telangana. Farmers require information on crop production technologies, input availability, pest and disease management, weather conditions, markets, government programmes, credit facilities and emerging agricultural innovations. Information management behaviour refers to the ways in which farmers seek, access, select, process, evaluate, store and utilise information to address their agricultural needs. Effective information management enables farmers to identify relevant information from different sources, assess its usefulness and apply it appropriately in farm decision-making. The study focused on the information management behaviour of farmers across three extension service systems in Telangana, namely public, private and NGO extension service systems. An Ex-post facto research design was adopted, with a total sample of 135 farmers. The analysis showed that, in the public extension service system, 55.56% of farmers had a medium level of information management behaviour, followed by high (24.44%) and low (20.00%) levels. In the private extension service system, 48.88% had a medium level, followed by low (33.33%) and high (17.79%) levels. In the NGO extension service system, 48.89% had a medium level, followed by low (35.55%) and high (15.56%) levels.
Keywords: Information management behaviour, agricultural extension, public extension, private extension, NGO extension, information seeking, information processing, information dissemination, farmers