Henna (Lawsonia inermis), is cultivated in Western Rajasthan (Arid Zone). The cultivation of henna is very intensive in and around Sojat and Marwar Junction Tehsils of Pali district (average annual rainfall > 400 mm /yr.). The cultivation of henna is spread over about 32000 ha area, which fetches more than 400 million Indian Rupees of revenue every year. On maturity, the stem of henna is very woody and harvesting is performed with a sharp edge curved heavy sickle. This operation involves a lot of human drudgery with a poor efficiency. To design and develop a harvesting machine/device for henna, it is imperative to study the effect of different parameters, viz. stem diameter, age of henna plant and moisture content of the stem’s woody material on cutting force. The paper deals with interactive as well as component relationships between the cutting force, stem diameter, moisture content and age of the henna plant. The data could be fitted in a multi linear relationship between age, moisture content, stem diameter and cutting force. The model is validated well as the slope of the plot between the observed and predicted values of the cutting force is close to unity (i.e. 0.97).

The Study was conducted for Adama India Private Limited and has covered six villages of Anand district through purposive sampling method. Both primary and secondary data were used to achieve stipulated objectives of the study. Primary data were collected through the help of structured schedule. Henry Garret ranking method, cross tabulation method, tabular and graphical analysis was used to achieve the objectives of the study. It was found in study that mainly farmers bought the input from cash and credit both. The 42% respondents had land holding between 2 to 4 hectors. Dealers play an important role for buying an input by farmers. In the study area cent percent farmers were using herbicides. Problem of weed in Paddy found out nursery as well as in main field. The major weeds which are found out in paddy filed are grasses, sedges and broad leaves weeds. Narkis is a selective, Systemic and post emergence herbicide in nursery and main field. The annual Market potential of the Narkis is Rs. 7.66 crore.

Front Line Demonstration (FLD) on high yielding variety and improved agro-techniques of linseed was conducted by Krishi Vigyan Kendra Bastar, Chhattisgarh, India during rabi season of 2015 and 2016 in 3 villages of 3 blocks viz. Jagdalpur, Bastar and Tokapal. The improved agro technology of linseed was demonstrated in an area of 0.4 ha of 55 farmers and 0.8 ha of 10 farmers. In total 30 ha of area were covered during two years of demonstration. Yield of linseed under improved practice was 6.0 and 6.3 q/ha, whereas under farmers practice yield was 3.9 and 4.6 q/ha during 2015 and 2016 respectively. Innovative practices increased the gross returns by 53.85 and 36.96%, net returns by 62.71 and 54.39% and B: C ratio by 4.22 and 10.73% during 2015 and 2016 respectively compared to farmer’s practice.

The study to assess the knowledge level of farmers about recommended practices of hybrid pearl millet cultivation for grain in Kharif season with sample size of 120 pearl millet growers of district Aligarh of Uttar Pradesh showed that the majority of the respondents were educated up to high school and intermediate. Land holding of majority of the respondents was between two to four acres. Major source of irrigation was electricity operated tube-well. Friends/relatives, fellow farmers, agricultural inputs dealers/shopkeepers, officers/ extension functionaries of state department of agriculture were the most frequently used information sources for agricultural information. Few farmers also participated in the extension activities organized by the different agencies engaged in agricultural development of the district. Maximum numbers of farmers were having knowledge about suitable varieties, mechanical method of weed management, seed rate and appropriate time of sowing of pearl millet. However, most of the farmers were lacking in knowledge about the insect-pest and disease management, and nutrient management in the pearl millet crop.

Experiments were done to determine the air flow resistance of potato bulk of bed depth ranging from 0.1 to 0.6 m using air at a velocity range of 2 to 12 m/s. Potatoes of 3 different sizes namely small, mixed and were used in the study. The observed data was modelled to get the relationship of air flow to pressure drop and to determine the effect of bed depth and size of potato tubers on air flow resistance. Among the models tested, the cubic model showed best fit for air flow resistance with R2 value of 0.99 followed by quadratic and linear model with R2 value of 0.98 and 0.92 respectively. The depth of the bulk significantly altered the air flow resistance (p<0.01) which was maximum at a depth of 0.6 m. Smaller sized potatoes resulted in air flow resistance which was significantly different (p<0.05) from the rest.

Farmer Interest Group (FIG) is a group of the farmers with common interest or goal and work together for achieving their common goal. The members work together to achieve this goal by pooling their existing resources, gaining better access to other resources and to share in the resulting benefits. With this regards the present study was conducted in Ahmedabad district of Gujarat state. Total 120 FIG members were selected from the four talukas of Ahmedabad district. They were interviewed personally by using Gujarati version of questionnaire. The findings of this study revealed that majority of the FIGs members belonged to middle age category, taken primary level of education, involved in farming coupled with animal husbandry as their main occupation, received 5 to 6 number of trainings, had membership in one organization, had medium level of extension contact, had very high level of economic motivation, innovativeness, achievement motivation and neutral attitude towards collectivism.

The Chhattisgarh state is considered as one of the centers of origin and evolution of rice and is blessed with enormous funds of rice variability. Being endowed with the most favorable climate, the state has an excellent agri-diversity, particularly for rice cultivars including scented cultivars. The demand for aromatic rice has dramatically increased over the past few years. Only, about less than 20 percent of the total rice area in Chhattisgarh has been covered by the fine and scented rice varieties. Most of such area belongs to tribal dominated northern and southern part of the state. In this perspective, this study was undertaken to assess the modern media utilization by scented rice growing tribal farmers and its role in their knowledge upgradation. The data was collected from 144 randomly selected scented rice growing tribal farmers from 12 villages identified from 4 blocks in Jashpur district using interview schedule by personal interview. The finding shows that the maximum scented rice growing farmers were oftenly using traditional sources like friends, relatives, progressive farmers etc. Modern media like internet, expert system etc were still found lacking in the area. Only, KCC and Kisan mobile advisory from KVK and state department of agriculture were utilized by some farmers regularly. Electronic media viz. TV and radio were popular in the area. About 19 percent respondents obtained the information from print media like Agricultural magazines and newspapers. The credibility was also found higher for traditional sources in comparison to modern, electronic and print media among the respondents. The impact of modern media in knowledge upgradation was found low may be due to less inclusion of scented rice technology in their communication. The study further suggested an integrated strategy for modern media blended with traditional sources for better information communication among the tribes.

The present study was undertaken to observe the nutritional and health status of farm women in Banaskantha District of North Gujarat. One thousand two hundred fifty farm women were included in the present investigation. The farm women belonged to nuclear family and had small family size. The educational status of farm women was low and engaged largely on agricultural labour work, had very less annual income and lived in Kachcha house. Apart from the diet, low socio-economic status and poverty, high level of illiteracy, physical work load, unavailability of different foods, ignorance and superstitions, lack of medical facilities, lack of use of modern contraceptives etc. were the other socio-demographic factors affecting the food consumption pattern and nutritional and health status of the farm women.

Water is one of the scarcest resources due to increasing population while agricultural growth depends upon the availability water resource potential in India that includes both the surface and ground water potential. Objective of study was to find out major decision criteria practiced by the farmers to use the ground water and develop the optimum plan by using ground water through tubewell irrigation water for 54 randomly selected farmers from Nainital district of Uttarakhand. Likert scale technique and t-statistics was used to find out the most relevant decision-criteria practiced by the farmers while linear programming was used to obtain optimum plans under various decision criteria. Maximization of total gross margin, minimization of risk, minimization of total labor use and minimization of total working capital emerged as main decisions criteria on which farmers took decision for using tubewell irrigation water in the study area. Total gross margin was increased by 3.3% while risk value, labour use and working capital were decreased with 6.01%, 30.23% and 32.30% in the optimum plan over existing plan.

The resent study was carried out to evaluate the effect of different organic and inorganic fertilizer treatment combinations on amendment in mine area soil of Olidih watershed in Jharkhand state of India. Soil samples were collected from study area and analyzed for Available Micronutrients (Cu, Zn, Fe, Mn) and heavy metals (Ni, Cr, Pb). Initially, the soil in study area was found moderately acidic and deficient in organic carbon, macronutrients and micronutrients. Pot experiment was conducted to analyze the effect of different inorganic and organic fertilizer treatments on soil chemical properties in a Maize-cowpea-paddy cropping system. A randomized complete block design was employed with seven treatments and four replicates per treatment. Results of the experiment showed that organic and inorganic fertilizers are effective in restoring the productivity of degraded soils.

Intercropping is the growing of two or more dissimilar crops simultaneously on the same piece of land. Intercropping can improve the crop productivity due to increased plant efficiency for utilization of sunlight with an adequate spatial distribution of various plant architectures. In young fruit orchards, growing economic crops in inter spaces of the fruit trees during first few years is referred as intercropping. It enables farmers to utilize not only the vacant space efficiently but also enable them to earn additional income from the same piece of land. They also act as a cover crop and the land benefits by the cultivation, irrigation, manuring given to the intercrops. Vegetables, being short duration, shallow rooted, bushy or climbing types with very low plant height makes them ideal companion of perennial large fruit trees. These are the best inter crops in terms of per unit area productivity and profitability when compared with cereals, millets or any other crop. Water requirements of the vegetable intercrops should not clash with those of the main fruit trees and should be kept well away from the main fruit trees and irrigated independently. The intercropping should be stopped when trees develop wide canopy and less space is available between two rows for raising secondary crop and also trees have shading effects on secondary crop. Thereafter, green manuring or cover cropping should be only practiced. It can be concluded that intercropping of short duration vegetables in fruit orchard not only maximize the resource utilization in terms of land, labour and other inputs but also play a pivotal role in minimizing the risk of crop failure by ensuring and enhancing the net income per unit of area. In this way, the sustained promotion of cultivation of high value fruits and other horticulture crops along with improvement in infrastructure can help enhance farmers’ income and net profitability.

A study was conducted to determine the effect of tillage practices on production of rice wheat cropping system in Indo-Gangetic plain land. The tillage systems evaluated were Zero, conventional and direct seeding by zero tillage. The results showed that there is a significant difference in yields among the tillage systems.

Largest area under mango cultivation in the world is in India. However, the productivity is one of the lowest. The reasons are many, large number senile orchards, traditional methods of cultivation, mostly rain-fed or with occasional flow irrigation during fruit development, poor attention to the canopy, nutrition, pest and diseases, and lack of use of Good Agricultural Practices (GAP), lack of awareness among farmers of modern techniques like micro irrigation and fertigation, Integrated Pest Management (IPM), Integrated Nutrition Management (INM), and modern post-harvest management methods. The Research and Development team of Jain Irrigation carried out a number of field trials, with high and ultra-high density plantation techniques in mango and tried to determine, irrigation and fertilizer requirement using drip technology and based on the results of soil and leaf analysis for targeted yields, and crop regulation by optimum canopy management and use of Paclobutrazol (PBZ) for early uniform and regular flowering. They followed, IPM, Global-GAP and standardized, a package of practices for mango cultivars, under high density (4.5 m X 4.5 m) and ultra- high-density mango (3 m X 2 m). The composite mango production technology thus developed over a period of 14 years in the Research, Development and Demonstration Farms of JISL is now extended to many growers in the country. The mango yields increased two to three times, the gestation period for the first harvest was reduced to three to four years, the quality of fruits was good for export and fruiting was regular even in shy-bearing cultivars like Alphonso and Himampasand.

The present study was carried out at farmers’ fields of Dausa district of Rajasthan during three consecutive years i.e. Rabi 2015-16, 2016-17 and 2017-18 which falls in Agroclimatic zone IIIa (Semi arid eastern plain zone). The soils of the experimental fields were sandy loam in texture, alkaline in reaction (pH 8.9-9.1), low in organic matter (0.12 -0.23), and nitrogen content and medium to high in potassium content. The study consists three treatments namely T1- Farmers practice (N120 P35), T2- Recommended practice (N90 P20), T3- Recommended practice (N90 P20) + water soluble NPK (19:19:19) spray at tillering and ear head emergence stage @ 1.5 percent. These treatments were replicated seven times during 2015-16 and ten times during 2016-17 and 2017-18 at farmers’ fields. Treatment T3 registered higher effective tillers per meter row length by the tune of 3.68, 5.40, 5.53 and 3.59 percent during 2015-16, 2016-17, 2017-18 and three years mean basis over treatment T1, respectively. On the three years mean basis the treatment T3 recorded 10.54 and 6.86 percent higher number of grains per ear over treatment T1 and T2, respectively. On three years mean basis treatment T3 was recorded 11.63 and 13.84 percent higher grain yield over treatment T1 and T2, respectively and 9.42 and 11.62 percent higher fodder yield over treatment T1 and T2, respectively. On the three years mean basis treatment T3 (Rs 109302/ha) recorded 11.01 and 13.25 percent higher gross returns over treatment T1 and T2, respectively. Similarly, on the three years mean basis treatment T3 (Rs 63487/ha) recorded 12.92 and 15.02 percent higher net returns over treatment T1 and T2, respectively. On the three years mean basis treatment T3 (2.41) recorded 2.55 and 2.12 percent higher B: C ratio over treatment T1 and T2, respectively.

Rainfall data of 10 year from (2003-2013) of study area kinnerasani basin has analysed here for trend analysis. The rainfall data collected from department of economics and statistics, Hyderabad. Study area covered with four mandals. Rainfall trend was also analyzed through linear regression line. The average annual rainfall of study area for 11 years from 2003 to 2013 was 1224.4 mm. The average annual precipitation in the Kinnerasani basin ranged from 621.1 mm to 1780.9 mm. The Burgampadu mandal received the highest amount of precipitation whereas the Gundala mandal received the lowest precipitation amount. July is the highest precipitation month followed by August in the basin.

The present investigation was conducted in four districts viz., Chhotaudepur, Dahod, Botad and Kheda of Gujarat state to study the association between selected characteristics of the drip adopted farmers and their time-lag in adoption of drip irrigation system. Total 200 drip adopted farmers were selected by random sampling as respondents. The findings of this investigation states that the independent variables like education, caste, mass media exposure, extension contact, economic motivation, scientific orientation, risk orientation, innovativeness, knowledge and attitude had negative and highly significant correlation with time-lag in adoption of DIS, whereas age, land holding and credit orientation of the drip adopted farmers had positive and significant correlation with time-lag in adoption of DIS. Rest traits viz, social participation, annual income, occupation, cropping intensity and market orientation exerted no influence on time-lag in adoption of DIS.

The psychological characters of individual play a vital role in the collection of information and adoption of advanced agriculture technology. Chhattisgarh state is considered as one of the centres of origin and evolution of rice and is blessed with enormous funds of rice variability. Being endowed with the most favorable climate, the state has an excellent agri-diversity, particularly for rice cultivars including scented cultivars. The demand for aromatic rice has dramatically increased over the past few years. Only, about less than 20 percent of the total rice area in Chhattisgarh has been covered by the fine and scented rice varieties. Most of such area belongs to tribal dominated northern and southern part of the state. In this perspective this study was undertaken to assess behavioural characteristics of scented rice growing tribal farmers. The data was collected from 144 randomly selected scented rice growing tribal farmers from 12 villages identified from 4 blocks in Jashpur district using interview schedule by personal interview. They had medium level of economic motivation, scientific orientation and risk orientation.

The present experiments were conducted during Kharif 2017 & 2018 for rice hybrid seed production of PRH-10 at Sabour condition. The successful development and use of hybrid rice production technology is prerequisite to exploit its benefit across the rice growing agro climatic regions. It was reported that the production technology of hybrid seed is very much influenced by the provenance. The parental line i.e., seed parent Pusa 6A and pollen parent PRR78 significantly differ in growth duration difference based on 50 percent flowering. The parental line sown with ten days seeding interval was found most synchronized in flowering. Application of GA3 was having significantly and positive effect on enhancing the panicle exertion alone or in combination with flag leaf clipping. For achieving maximum hybrid seed yield per ha planting ratio 2:8 and application of GA3 in combination with flag leaf clipping and supplementary pollination (rope pulling) is best in sabour (Bihar) condition.

In the present study, an attempt was made to develop an instrument to measure the farmers’ participation in effective canal irrigation management. Farmers’ participation in effective canal irrigation management is defined as the extent of water users’ involvement in different activities viz., equitable distribution of irrigation water, crop selection and management, scheduling of irrigation water, water delivery system and maintenance of field channels etc., for effective management of irrigation water. The method of summated rating scale suggested by Likert (1932) and Edwards (1969) were followed in the develop an instrument through six stages viz., identification of dimension, collection of items/statements, relevancy analysis, item analysis, reliability and validity of the scale. Based on the review of literature and discussion with experts in the related areas, six dimensions viz., farmers’ participation in formulation of guidelines, planning and implementation activities, maintenance activities, responsibility sharing, crop planning activities and integrated crop management were listed and 60 items/statements were enlisted. Based on the relevancy percentage equal and more than 80.00 percent and mean relevancy score of equal and more than 4.00 were considered for inclusion in the item analysis. After the relevancy analysis and item analysis, out of 60 items/statements, 34 statements were retained. In order to compute the scale values for each of the identified dimensions by adopting normalized ranking method recommended by Guilford (1954) and the total scale value ranges from 9.340 to 2.537, with farmers’ participation in integrated crop management got highest rank and formulation of guidelines got lowest rank. The developed instrument was found to be reliable (0.96) and valid (0.98), hence it can be used to measure the farmers’ participation in effective canal irrigation management.