Knowledge, Adoption and Economics of Integrated Pest Management in Paddy in Vizianagaram District, Andhra Pradesh

摘要

On-farm demonstrations of IPM in paddy were carried out by DAATT Centre (District agriculture advisory and transfer of technology centre) in Vizianagaram district, Andhra pradesh for suppressing the crop pests; reducing the cost of production to farmers and ensuring quality produce to the consumers. IPM verification trials were conducted under farmer's conditions as well as large scale implementation of IPM through farmers' participatory approach at five villages in Vizianagaram district of Andhra Pradesh. Adoption of IPM practices resulted in increase in rice yield from 5.45 to 6.33 tonnes/ha in Vizianagaram district during kharif, 2007,2008 & 2009. The cost of plant protection using IPM in paddy is reduced by 31.5% as compared to farmer's practiceof plant protection. The cost-benefit ratio of rice is 2.17 in IPM farmers as compared to 1.85 in Non-IPM farmers. Knowledge and adoption of IPM in paddy was studied in five villages consisting of 20 IPM fanners and non-IPM farmers. Majority of IPM farmer's (50%) had high extension contact and majority of non-IPM farmers had (54%) medium extension contact. Majority of IPM farmers (3 8%) having medium farm holding and majority of non-IPM (44%) were small farmers. Fifty two per cent of the IPM farmers possessed high knowledge level and remaining farmers possessed medium (36%) and low (12%) level knowledge regarding paddy IPM practices. Whereas forty four percent of non-IPM farmers possessed medium level of knowledge followed by high (40%) and low (16%)level of knowledge on paddy IPM. Forty percent of IPM farmers had high adoption level and forty eight percent of IPM farmers had medium adoption level. Thirty two per cent of non-IPM farmers had high adoption level of IPM practices followed by medium level adoption ( 28%). The success of IPM technology through demonstrations were found to be more suitable in increasing the knowledge and adoption level of the paddy farmers.