A Scale to Measure the Attitude of Cotton Growers towards Weather Based Agro-Advisory Services in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh States

Abstract

In this modern era, climate change is the most severe challenge experienced in the field of agriculture. To become climate smart, farmers should be equipped well with weather forecast information in prior to do farm operations. Hence, this study represents the construction of an attitude scale to understand the attitude of farmers towards weather based agro-advisory services. Keeping this in view, an attempt has been made to develop a scale for measuring the attitude of farmers towards weather based agro-advisory services in cotton cultivation. Likert’s method of summated rating technique was adopted to construct the scale. Based on the available literature and expert’s opinion, 40 statements were developed. After editing as per informal criteria, 33 statements were subjected to item analysis among the farmers of non-sample area. Out of which, 30 statements were retained in the developed attitude scale based on the highest ‘t’ value. The ‘r’ (correlation coefficient) value was found to be 0.852 which represents significant at 1 per cent level and the reliability and validity of the constructed scale were found appropriate to measure the attitude of cotton farmers towards weather based agro-advisory services.