Socio-economic and communicational characteristics of respondents studied under demonstration component of NICRA project

The National Innovations on Climate Resilient Agriculture (NICRA) project aims to improve resilience of Indian agriculture to climate change and climate vulnerability by the way of strategic research and technology demonstration. This investigation was undertaken to know socio-economic and communicational characteristics of respondents studied under demonstration component of NICRA project. The study was confined to Ratnagiri district from Konkan region and Aurangabad (Chattrapati Sambhajinagr) districts from Marathwada region of Maharashtra state. All the ten operational villages of the NICRA Project i.e. five villages from Ratangiri district and five villages from Aurangabad (Chattrapati Sambhajinagar) district were selected. Further five villages from each district were selected for getting responses from non-beneficiary respondents. In all, 70 beneficiary farmers from NICRA villages and 70 non-beneficiary farmers from Non-NICRA villages were selected randomly from each selected district. Thus, a total of 280 farmers from two district i.e.140 from Ratnagiri district and 140 from Aurangabad i.e. Chattrapati Sambhajinagar district were selected for the present investigation. The data were collected by using well developed interview schedule. The data were collected, tabulated and analysed by using proper statistical measures. The study revealed that the majority of respondents fall within the 40 to 59 years age group. This middle-aged group is more actively involved in farming compared to their younger and older counterparts. The educational profile of the respondents reveals a disparity between regions. The study shows that a significant number of respondents have small to semi-medium land holdings. The annual income levels of the respondents varied significantly between the two regions. Mass media exposure among the beneficiary farmers is relatively high, particularly due to their participation in training sessions conducted by KVK.