Post-adoption behaviour of farmers towards horticultural soil and water conservation technologies for watershed management in India

Abstract

Indian Institute of Soil and Water Conservation (IISWC) and its Research Centres have developed many model watershed projects in India in the past and implemented many horticultural Soil and Water Conservation (SWC) technologies for sustainable watersheds management. Though many evaluation studies were conducted on these watershed projects in the past but assessment of the post-adoption status of different horticultural SWC technologies over a longer period has not been done yet. It was imperative to appraise the behaviour of the farmers with regard to continuance & discontinuance of the horticultural technologies adopted, diffusion & infusion that took place and technological gaps that occurred in due course of time on post watershed management. The research study was carried out during 2012-15 as core project at Vasad as lead Centre along with IISWC headquarter Dehradun, and Centres Bellary, Chandigarh, Kota & Ooty, with the specific objectives of the study to measure the extent of post-adoption behaviour (continue-adoption, discontinuance, technological gap and diffusion) of farmers towards adopted horticultural SWC technologies of watershed management. In the present study various indices regarding continue adoption, discontinuance, technological gap and diffusion towards horticultural soil and water conservation technologies for watershed management were developed for measurement of post-adoption behaviour of farmers. It was revealed that seventy percent(71.08%) of horticultural SWC technologies were continued adopted and about thirty percent(28.91%) were discontinued by farmers. Out of the total continued adopted horticultural SWC technologies by farmers, one-third(33.84%) of technologies were continued adopted with technological gap. About one-fifth (22.02%) of horticultural SWC technologies were also diffused to other farmers' fields in nearby villages from the watersheds developed by the IISWC and its Centres.