'Uzhavan app' as a conduit to reduce the digital divide by fostering vital agricultural extension services in the state of Tamil Nadu, India

摘要

Modern-age ICT tools (agricultural mobile apps) have stepped forward to reduce the digital divide among the farmers. The intention of providing timely, reliable and quality information had been the major problem in delivering agricultural extension services. Tamil Nadu Government, India launched a bi-lingual (Tamil and English) Uzhavan mobile application, the intent of enhancing the speed of delivering agricultural extension services and upsurging farm production. The study objected to finding who were all the users and their perception about the Uzhavan app. Using ex-post facto research design, data were collected from a sample of 90 Uzhavan app users in Thanjavur District of Tamil Nadu, India during January 2020 using a proportionate random sampling method. The result indicated that most of the Uzhavan app users were educated, had frequent contact with extension agents, and had ample exposure towards mass media especially social media and it has relatively lowered the information searching time.