Abstract
ABSTRACT: Agriculture is considered as the main driving force in Pakistan’s economy employing 45% of the country’s labor force and generating 20% of national GDP Agriculture sector of Pakistan is facing numerous challenges including non-adoption of agricultural technology at the farm level, due to farmers’ lack of access to the latest information. In this context, the current study focusses on the use of the mobile phone in accessing agricultural information among the farmers of the of district Muzaffargarh,Punjab, Pakistan. A multistage sampling technique was used to collect data from the two tehsils (cities/sub-districts) of Muzaffargarh formulating a total sample of 180 farmers. SPSS computer-based Software was used for analyzing the data. Results revealed that 91.2% of the farmers indicated mobile phone ownership. It was further reported that 87.20 % of the farmers used private sectors advisory staff to obtain agriculture information. Market information was ranked as the highest accessed information among the rest of farm-related use. Easy access to updated information and connectivity with stakeholders were reported as the highest perceived benefits of mobile phone use (4.63 & 4.72 mean). Findings reported that farmers’ limited aptitude of Mobile phone usage and lack of awareness of information sources as major constraints in farm-related use of the Mobile phone. On the basis of findings, the current study provided recommendations and policy implications for utilizing the true potential of these ICT-enabled solutions in agriculture.
Highlights
Information and communication technologies (ICT) the mobile phone has immensely penetrated every field of life like education, business, commerce, and agriculture
Farmers attributes regarding mobile phone use Farmer’s characteristics like possession duration and their aptitude of mobile phone play a pivotal role in understanding its farm-related use and factors associated with its adoption
Results shown in figure 6 described the agriculture information sources being used by farmers in the study area
Summary
Information and communication technologies (ICT) the mobile phone has immensely penetrated every field of life like education, business, commerce, and agriculture. Recent statistics showed that 62.9 percent of the population worldwide already own a mobile phone with 4.68 billion users on the planet (STATISTA, 2019) This trend is similar in Pakistan as the country has seen an abrupt rise in mobile phone users from 88 million in 2008 to 152 million in 2018 (PTA, 2018). Smooth exchange on information is a key to the successful adoption of farm innovation needed for the agricultural development but due to lack of resources and poor infrastructure in many developing countries, a huge communication asymmetry exists between the latest agricultural knowledge and farmers (BALOCH & THAPA, 2014) In this scenario ICT, the mobile phone has shown a great potential to facilitate communication by enabling the smooth exchange of knowledge between the various stakeholders in agriculture (AKER, 2011)
Sign-in/Register to view highlights & summary Sign-in/Register to access full text options 
Talk to us
Join us for a 30 min session where you can share your feedback and ask us any queries you have
Schedule a callDisclaimer: All third-party content on this website/platform is and will remain the property of their respective owners and is provided on "as is" basis without any warranties, express or implied. Use of third-party content does not indicate any affiliation, sponsorship with or endorsement by them. Any references to third-party content is to identify the corresponding services and shall be considered fair use under The CopyrightLaw.
