TRAINING NEEDS IN MAJOR SUBJECT AREAS FOR BASE LINE WORKERS IN THE FISHERIES SECTOR OF ASSAM

Abstract

Capacity building of baseline workers is one of the most important factors in ensuring better performance. In the fishery sector of Assam all the Fishery Demonstrators (FD) are the grassroot functionaries of the sector and they play vital roles to carry out the various activities. Keeping this in mind, a study was conducted to find out the nature and intensity of training needs and to identify the preference in respect of duration, location, method, type and other relevant aspects pertaining to training and capacity building. It was found that the FDs felt that the aspects of water and soil quality were greatly needed, followed by the aspects of disease, fish seed, breeding, extension, feeding, resource management, culture, marketing, official and capture fishery. It was also found that the most of the FDs were middle aged, fairly experienced, hail from rural background, has undergone one in-service training, belong to medium monthly family income group are posted near the district H.Q and residing in rented house. There were no significant differences in Training Need Quotient (TNQ) between FDs who are from rural and urban area. The respondents preferred either October to December or January to March as the training season. Most of the FDs preferred training of two weeks duration outside the state, followed by College of Fisheries, Directorate of Fisheries and District Headquarters. They were of the opinion that equal emphasis should be given to both theory and practical aspects during the training programme. Key words: Training needs, Fishery demonstrators, Assam