Identification of User Needs for Setting up
Agricultural Planning and Information Bank (APIB)
in the East Khasi Hills District of Meghalaya
Prepared by:
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Dr. P.P. Nageswara Rao
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Kum. J.M. Nongkynrih
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Kum. Jonali Goswami
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Kum. Pratibha Thakuria
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Shri Liagi Tajo
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Shri Dibyajyoti Chutia
Approved by:
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Dr. P.P. Nageswara Rao
Project Director, APIB
North Eastern Space Applications Centre
Govt. of India, Department of Space
Umiam-793103, Meghalaya
Contents
Page
Forewordi
Prefaceii
1.0. Background for the Report01
2.0. The Agro-Climatic Scenario in the East Khasi Hill District02
3.0. The Approach for Assessing the User Needs03
- Progressive Farmer03
- Extension Personnel03
- The Questionnaire04
4.0. Results of the Survey05
4.1. Agro Climatic Zone-Wise Priority of Crops05
4.2. Farming Choices Preferred In the District054.3. Information Needs Expressed By Farmers 06 4.4. First Priority Information Needs Expressed by Extension Officers 10
5.0. Conclusions12
Annexure-I: Information Needs in the Agriculture, Horticulture, etc Sector 13
Annexure-II: Soil Conservation and Forest Management Sector.29
Annexure-III: Water Resource Sector.35
Annexure-IV: Animal Husbandry, Sericulture, Fisheries, etc.39
Annexure-V: Preferred Mode of Information Dissemination.46
Annexure-VI: Information Needs Expressed by Extension Personnel.50
Foreword
The economy of the North Eastern States has remained dominantly agriculture based. While the potential for development of the rural economy of the region through agriculture is vast, this sector has not made much progress as compared to the rest of the country due to various reasons. In an age of liberalization of the economy and globalization, modern agriculture can thrive only with uptodate information access to the farming community. Information and communication technology has a critical role to play in the development of agriculture. Contribution to this endeavour from space technology is available in the form of data on land use, soil, weather etc as well as communication connectivity in difficult terrains, through satellites providing remote sensing, communication and weather monitoring services. Department of Space has been actively engaged in extending these services to all sectors of economy covering the remotest parts of the country.
The Agricultural Planning and Information Bank project of NESAC/DOS in association with Government of Meghalaya is an effort in providing a single window access system for geo-spatial and other agriculture related information to the farming community. The ISRO experience on a similar project elsewhere in the country is utilized on a pilot basis in East Khasi Hills District of Meghalaya.
Assessment of the needs of the farmers to transform agriculture and allied sectors as a vehicle of economic prosperity is the first step in this project. These needs will be updated and refined continuously during the progress of the project. Its success will pave the way for extending the experience to other parts of NE Region.
November, 2004 K C Bhattacharyya
Director, NESAC
Preface
Modern agriculture is highly knowledge intensive and requires the support of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) for planning and decision making. Information needs in the agriculture and allied sectors are quite different from other sectors. While the farmer has some control over a few of the resources e.g., land and water resources, labour, seeds, etc. there are several other variables that are beyond his control – the weather, power and market, prices, etc. Connectivity for information exchange on supply and demand position of commodities and the appropriate technologies can improve the efficiency of agriculture sector. The Internet, satellite communication, remote sensing, and GIS are providing new opportunities to connect people, to obtain and disseminate information and to bring in a new revolution in agriculture.
Hoping that ICT can provide better opportunities in the agriculture development, and based on a few successful experiments carried out in this direction, the North Eastern Space Applications Centre (NESAC) in collaboration with the Government of Meghalaya has decided to set-up an ICT-based Agricultural Planning and Information Bank (APIB) for the East Khasi Hills district. A Steering Committee and five Working Groups are guiding and reviewing the progress of the project. As per the directions of the Steering Committee given during the second meeting, the Working Groups have facilitated discussions with the farmers and extension officers in the East Khasi Hills district and based on their feed-back user need assessment report is compiled.
This report gives details of the work done by a team of Scientists/Engineers viz. Kum. Jenita M. Nongkynrih, Kum. Jonali Goswami, Kum. Pratibha Thakuria, Shri. Liagi Tajo and Shri Dibyajyoti Chutia with the support of Dr. C.O. Rangad, District Agriculture Officer, Shri O. Suin, Agriculture Extension Officer (AEO), Shri Suchen, AEO, Smt. Skhemlon, AEO, Smt. B. Laso, AEO under the guidance of Dr. P.P. Nageswara Rao, Project Director, APIB. The report gives details of the questionnaire, methodology adopted for seeking feedback from farmers and extension personnel in the district, and the information needs expressed by them.
It is hoped that this report will serve the purpose of providing the inputs necessary for the APIB project team and various Departments of Government of Meghalaya to focus their attention on supplying the information services sought by the farmers and enabling the decision makers in the effective implementation of the developmental schemes of agriculture and allied sectors in the State of Meghalaya.
August 12, 2004 (K. N. Kumar)
Shillong Secretary & Commissioner
Government of Meghalaya
1.0Background
Modern agriculture is highly knowledge intensive and requires timely, reliable and accurate information on natural resource endowments, their usage pattern at present and technology available for their future utilization and other information about markets, weather, insurance, subsidy, etc. The decision makers at various levels have to do a lot of running around in the collection of data from sources like various institutions of Indian Council of Agricultural Research (ICAR), AgriculturalUniversities, Department of Agriculture, Department of Statistics, and Remote Sensing Centres. It involves considerable time, resulting in inefficient utilization of the capabilities. Therefore, a “single window access” from where all types of data and information can be obtained or collected, will enable the planners to concentrate more on developmental planning, instead of frittering away their time and energy in data collection.Connectivity between data collectors and suppliers and data/information exchange through electronic media can improve the efficiency of this sector. Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) that includes the Internet, satellite communication, remote sensing, and GIS are providing new opportunities to connect people, to obtain and disseminate information and to bring a new revolution in agriculture.
Hoping that ICT can provide opportunities to reach the un-reached and to include the excluded in the agriculture development, and based on a few successful experiments carried out in this direction, the North Eastern Space applications Centre (NESAC) in collaboration with the Department of Agriculture, Government of Meghalaya has decided to set-up an ICT-based Agricultural Planning and Information Bank (APIB) for the East Khasi Hills district with a special emphasis on overall development.
Towards executing this task in time-bound project mode, a Steering Committee and five Working Groups are guiding and reviewing the progress of the project. As per the directions of the Steering Committee, given during the second meeting, the Working Groups have facilitated discussions with the farmers and extension Officers in four blocks of the East Khasi Hills district and based on their feed-back this user need assessment report is compiled.
2.0The Agro -climatic Scenario in the East Khasi Hills district, Meghalaya.
East Khasi Hills district is covered under the Agro-climatic Region- Meghalaya-Mikir Region. A part of the district falls under the Temperate Sub-Alpine zone, and other part in the Mild Tropical Hill Zones. As per the classification scheme of National Bureau of Soil Survey and Land Use Planning (NBSS&LUP), the East Khasi Hills district falls under Warm Per humid Agro-eco Sub Region. The climate of East Khasi Hills varies according to elevation and exposure. The Central Highlands with elevation of 1500 metres and above have a temperate climate; Places at lower elevations are warm and humid. Rainfall also varies from place to place. Places on the southern escarpment, facing the south-west monsoons (viz. Pynursla- Cherrapunji- Mawsynram) receive an average annual rainfallof 9000-11000mm. This region experiences a short water deficit of about 50-130mm during post monsoon. The soils of district are light to heavy in texture. They are acidic and rich in organic matter but poor in phosphorous. Potash content varies from medium to high. Red soils are commonly found in the central and sub-montane regions while black and red loam occurs in the low lying hills.The wide variations in the soil-climatic conditions offer scope for the cultivation of a wide variety of agricultural and horticultural crops, ranging from species adapted to tropical to temperate climates.
Various departments of government of Meghalaya have established a well organized network of Research Stations, extension units and service centres.The ICAR Research Complex for NEH Region is also doing yeoman service in the region.Other agencies like Small Farmers’ Development Agency, the Marginal Farmers’ Development Agency, Integrated Rural Development Agency and various commercial Banks are contributing to the development of agriculture and rural prosperity. Various departments of NEHU also are conducting research and development in this sector. However, scattered patches of shifting cultivation, the peculiar land tenure system (viz. the Ri Kynti and the Ri Raid), narrow valley lands (i.e. small agricultural fields), severe soil erosion, pests, diseases and weeds, dearth of motorable roads for transportation and lack of adequate storage and post harvest, and processing facilities are some of the constraints that call for deployment of advanced technologies for communication and information exchange and dissemination. The APIB is one such attempt to create easy single window access.
3.0 The Approach for Assessing the User Needs in the District
This study was conducted to identify theinformation needs of different groups of users involved in agricultural planning and implementation. While the broad objective of the study was to identify and classify the information required by various users, the specific objectives were:
- To identify the nature of information required by farmers and extension officials,
- To classify the information based on its nature, and
- To identify the most effective channel for disseminating different types of information.
Users’ need assessment was done for the following two groups, namely progressive farmers and agriculture extension personnel. The first category of users rely more on the personal contacts, extension persons in the fieldand published data for their information needs. The second category of the users depends heavily on the publications from the government departments and research institutions.
Progressive farmers
Progressive farmers are those interested in latest technology evolved by agricultural researchers in agricultural universities and research stations. They are also keen in sharing their knowledge with fellow farmers. About 30 farmers were selected from the East Khasi Hill district representing small, medium and large farmers. The selection of farmers in each of the selected blocks was done based on agro climatic zones.
Extension Personnel
This group of users is engaged in dissemination of agricultural technology to the farmers. They constitute the first level of contact for the progressive farmers to obtain the latest information on technology, agro techniques and to offer solutions for problems faced by them. The respondents selected were the Agriculture Extension Officers who are responsible for implementing the plans at the block-level.
The questionnaire
The methodology of assessing the information needs consists of three aspects, viz., review of literature, group meetings and rapid appraisal techniques and, primary field survey through structured questionnaire.Group meetings and rapid appraisal techniques have been adopted for the study to assess the user needs. The group discussions and interview through interpersonal contact was carried out with a ready made questionnaire addressing the following aspects.
- Type and nature of information by user group
- Source of information by user group
- Practice of the knowledge the user groups have gained through different methods
- The use (relevance) of information
- Their perception levels of targeted groups in terms of their literacy, reading habits, viewing and hearing of electronic media
For all the user groups taken together, the structured questionnaire contained 30 to 35 major items and 4 to 5 sub items under each major item. The questionnaire given to Agriculture Extension officers was in English whereas the ones supplied to the farmers were in Khasi language. Depending on the number of farmers opted for a particular information item, a priority ranking was given. Accordingly the items that are chosen by more than 60 percent of farmers was considered as first priority. Wherever it was marginally lower than 60 per cent, some judgment was used to decide on the priority.
The responses obtained from the extension personnel and farmers are tabulated and presented in Annexure-1 to VI. In the case of the user group consisting of farmers, the analysis also present the land holding size, crops grown, technology and the diversification adopted by the farmers.
In addition to the exhaustive list of items of information likely to be sought through the questionnaire, the respondents were asked to state what other data are required. They were only a few responses for this question which has been incorporated in the concerned chapters of this report.The survey also tried to ascertain from the respondents, the present position of availability of data and information. In other words the respondents were asked to say what information they are getting at present and sources of such data and information. This has also been presented in the report at appropriate places.
4.0 Results of the Survey.
4.1 Agroclimatic Zone-wise priority of crops
In Mawkynrew and Mawryngkneng CD Blocks: The dominant crop is potato. This is part of the potato growing belt of the district. Potato is grown twice a year, i.e. summer potato and winter potato. Major portion of the land under agriculture is under potato. Cabbage and maize occupies the second place, just next to potato. These crops are grown only once in a year.Carrots, tomatoes, garlic, mustard, fruits (pear, peach, plums, etc.) are also grown by only a few farmers in these blocks because of the high cost of seed, fertilizer and low income.
Mawsynram and Pynursla CD blocks:Paddy cultivation, both dry and wet, is carried out on the gentle slopes and the plain areas in the southern border. These are the areas where arecanut plantation dominates most of the agricultural land. Fruits crops like oranges, lemon, papaya, jackfruit, pineapple are grown extensively. Betel leaf is grown along with Arecanut plantations in Pynursla block. In Mawsynram, pepper, tez patta, broom stick, turmeric, ginger, sweet potato are cultivated in most part.
4.2 Farming Choices Preferred in the District
While the hilly terrain of the district is suitable for mixed farming systems such as agro-pastoral, horticultural, agro-horti-silvi-pastoral and livestock-based systems, the choice of farming preferred in the district are in the following order: Horticulture > piggery > poultry > cattle rearing.
The farmers inhabiting the gentle slopes and near the valleys prefer to have predominantly agriculture-based farming system. The choice of cropping systems are: Rice-based (Rice-Mustard-Potato/Radish); Maize-based (Maize-Groundnut/Soyabean/Mustard/Raddish/Potato/ Tomato) and Oil-seed based (Groundnut-Rapeseed mustard/Pigeon pea/Rajama/Green gram/Black gram).
Among the food crops rice is the preferred crop followed by maize, wheat and millets. Among cash crops, potato is the most important. Many horticultural crops like Orange, banana, pineapple, guava, lemon, jack-fruit, litchi in the lower altitudes and exotic fruits like pears, peaches, plums etc. in higher altitudes are grown. Animal husbandry, fishery, dairy farming, piggery, sheep rearing, poultry keeping, etc. are subsidiary occupations of the rural population.
4.3 Information Needs Expressed by Farmers
General Background of the Farmers:Thirty farmers were interviewed in East Khasi Hills district of Meghalaya to ascertain their information needs and type of data requirements. The farmers were spread over four selected blocks namely Mawsynram, Pynursla, Mawkynrew and Mawryngkneng equally. The farmers have land holdings of size 2-3 acres, 3-5 acres, 5-10 acres and above 10 acres.
The questionnaire elicited the information needs of the selected farmers at the block level. Details of data and information needs expressed by the farmers, categorized into five major information areas are presented as follows: