eChapters

Interpersonal Behavior is the study of one’s own perception, knowledge, attitude & motivation and how these affect one’s behavior to the self & with others. It is characterized mainly by 3 factors. A. Communication skill (Knowledge / literacy / intelligence, Listening skill, Verbal skill and Active listening/feedback). B. Emotional intelligence (Self-awareness and Emotional maturity) C. Social skill (Good eye contact, Body language and Empathy/ understanding & assimilating ability). For Understanding Interpersonal Behaviors, Behavioral scientists recommend the use of Johari Window & Transactional Analysis (TA).

Johari Window is a psychological too created by Joseph Luft& Harry Ingham in 1955 in USA.. It helps people to understand their better interpersonal relations & communication. The Johari Window model is also referred to as a ‘disclosure/feedback model of self-awareness’, and by some people an ‘information processing tool’. The Johari Window actually represents information - feelings, experience, views, attitudes, skills, intentions, motivation, etc - within or about a person - in relation to their group, from four perspectives. Johari window four quadrants: 1. what is known by the person about him/herself and is also known by others - open area, open self, free area, free self, or ‘the arena’. 2. what is unknown by the person about him/herself but which others know - blind area, blind self, or ‘blind spot‘. 3. what the person knows about him/herself that others do not know - hidden area, hidden self, avoided area, avoided self or ‘facade‘. 4. What is unknown by the person about him/herself and is also unknown by others - unknown area or unknown self.

Miles to go for uplifting the entire population above the poverty line. But the picture was different in ancient times. As life style was simple, all amenities required in daily life were available within the villages. In need social system used to spread its helping hand towards the distressed. But the stability of the system becomes disturbed by invasion of foreigners and exploitation of foreign rulers.

In the British period series of famines from 1875 to 1901, numbering 18 out of a total 3 3 during the whole 19^th Century, the Government was compelled to appoint some Commissions and imposed some acts and established Development Departments like Agriculture, Animal Husbandry and Veterinary irrigation etc. The journey for rural development stated from here by Government.

Role-play is a product of ‘play’, ‘games’ and ‘simulation’ (Gabrielle McSharry, 2000). In science education, role-play may be seen as an interaction between these three components – either in combination or by themselves – and students who perform such activities results in learning outcome. In the context of social studies, role-play is used to learn the issues and decisions of the past and how things might have been different in local community in a broader setting. Aside from knowledge acquisition, preparing and conducting a role-play activity strengthens students’ knowledge, acquisition skills, their creativity, their values clarification skills and a variety of interpersonal skills identified in the curriculum outcomes. As an effective instructional teaching strategy, role-playing emphasizes the social nature of learning and sees cooperative behaviour as stimulating students both socially and intellectually.

ABSTRACT

India is a developing country and agriculture is at the core of this development. Youth participation in agriculture for its sustained contribution to a nation’s development is crucial but this is not ascertained. FAO has declared year 2014 as the International Year of Family Farming (IYFF). Today’s youth are tomorrow’s family farmers, and maintaining interest in farming as a profession is vital to future food security. The number of young people of working age is increasing while the same group is typically rejecting careers in agriculture and food system. This scenario can be changed by cultivating the next generation of agricultural leaders—not just as farmers but as food entrepreneurs, scientists, agronomists, extension agents, union and government leaders etc. Governments, particularly in developing countries, need to invest in policies and practices that provide access to land, credit and banking services, education and knowledge, and technical skills for young farmers. And these governments need to ensure that young people have access to markets, goods and service, employment opportunities, and leisure so that they prefer to stay on the farm.

ABSTRACT

Youth denotes-”Young, Original, Unique, Talented, and Hopeful”. Youths represent the most active segment of the population and the engine that do most productive work of the society (Adesope, 1996). Youths are a formidable force in the agricultural production, process, constituting a sizeable proportion of future progressive farmers and better citizens, especially in the rural areas. Fifty percent of Indian population has average age group 25 and more than 65 percent below the age of 35 years therefore United Nations (2005) defines youth as ‘all individuals aged between 15 and 24 year’ and declared 2014 as the “International Year of Family Farming”. Family farming is a means of organizing agricultural, forestry, fisheries, pastoral and aquaculture production which is managed and operated by a family and predominantly reliant on family labour, including both of women and men.

INTRODUCTION

The National Rural Employment Guarantee Act 2005(NREGA) was brought into force by the Union Government in February 2006 which was renamed on 2^nd October 2009 as MGNREGA i.e. Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act. It is the first nation-wide employment scheme that guarantees employment legally to India’s rural population. According to the Union Rural Development Ministry’s figures, more than 1.36 crore people of the country’s total population have been given jobs under the Act. It guarantees 100 days of unskilled jobs per rural household. This is meant to regenerate the rural natural resource base, which in turn, will result in sustainable livelihoods for residents. It is with this background the present article has been planned with the specific objectives to explore the extent of awareness about NREGA among the target group of the Act. Ray (2008) told that, director, Development, Allahabad University included NREGA in the curriculum of rural sociology and has suggested that seminar; workshops and university publications can be used for awareness generation. UNIFEM Workshop (2009) concluded that, in case of Kerala, Kudumbashree and Panchayat have been very vigilant in spreading awareness about NREGA through radio, poster, television, notice board on gram Sabhas, etc.

During the last visit of Barak Obama in the year 2011, he pointed out that India is fortunate to have a youth population with a half of the total population being under the age of 30-35 years. Out of 600 million young people, over 60% live in villages and majority of them are educated. Mahatma Gandhi considered that migration of rural youth from villages to town and cities as the most serious form of brain drain affecting adversely rural India’s development. The National Commission on Farmers stressed the need for attracting and retaining rural youth in farming. Recently, National Sample Survey has indicated that over 45% people want to quit farming under these condition there is need to persuade educated youth including farm graduates to stay in villages and take up agriculture as a profession. There are various economic opportunities for farm graduates which are discussed below:

INTRODUCTION

The trend of rising unemployment is compounded by the existences of regional imbalances in development, within the country, which have collectively accelerated the phenomenon of migration. The history of migration is the history of people’s struggle to survive and to prosper, to escape insecurity and poverty, and to move in response to opportunity. In developing countries like India, migration mostly takes place not due to the so called the full forces of the destination place, as usually happens in case of developed countries, but because of poverty, unemployment, natural calamities and under development of the origin place. Migration in developing countries like India is still viewed as a survival strategy. In India internal mobility is critical to the livelihoods of many peoples, especially for people from rural areas. In the Dindigul District of Tamil Nadu, NREGA works have stemmed migration from many villages. Ministry of Rural Development (2006). It has been conceptualized that, creating job out of NREGA programme will check the migration of the people from one place to another. In Pusa block, of Samastipur district the NREGA is in operation for about two and half years. It is with this background the present article has been presented with the specific objectives toexplore the extent ofmigration check among NREGA beneficiaries, running in this block.

ABSTRACT

The conventional agricultural extension service in India is mainly provided by extension workers visiting farmers to provide agricultural advisory services. This system of extension service provision faces a number of challenges including the few number of extension workers and limited resources. The effectiveness of an impact-driven, radio-based extension service delivery system that has been introduced in some rural areas of India. The system aims to enable extension workers to reach many farmers with minimum efforts. However little is known about the effectiveness of this new extension service delivery system. In rural areas, farmers have started sharing agricultural related information and best practices. Some farmers have also started to change their farming practices. This brings a new finding that farmers can adopt and practice easily what is aired by their fellow farmers in the community radio stations.

ABSTRACT

Small holdings in developing countries have long been associated with poor farming practices, intensive labour and low income, which make the sector unattractive to a new generation of farmers. Lack of youth interest and involvement in agriculture affects the sustainability and survival of family farms. This interest in farming is further strengthened by ICT providing access to markets and information to boost production. Researchers found that youngsters easily grasp the ICT applications, acquire information, and jump onto new market opportunities. Considering the above facts the present paper will address the issue of the role that ICT can play in invoking the interest of youth in farming.

Keywords:ICT, youth, farming, sustainability

The Indian food industry is poised for huge growth, increasing its contribution in world food trade every year. In India, food processing is gaining importance as now it is being considered as profit industry. The increased demand for processed food in the domestic market and Indian foods getting popularized in the global market has put food processing industry on high priority list by the entrepreneurs. Accounting for about 32 percent of the country’s total food market, the food processing industry is one of the largest industries in India and is ranked fifth in terms of production, consumption and export. The total food production in India is likely to double in the next ten years with the country’s domestic food market estimated to reach US$ 258 billion by 2015. The food industry in India has been attracting a lot of attention from foreign investors in the area of processing, development of infrastructure for storage and transportation and retail marketing and scenario is changing rapidly.

India’s agrarian culture and economy is undergoing drastic changes. In this progressive path of agricultural resurrection, a comprehensive multidimensional understanding of agricultural development is of great importance. In the present context of Kerala, where the local administrative bodies are vested with more powers to plan and execute need based agricultural development activities, a clear understanding of the concept of agricultural development among the major stakeholders shall serve as a firm base for development.

Today, in many countries mobile phones are being used by farmers, not only as a person voice communication medium but also to provide access to  information through sending message service (SMS), multimedia messages service (MMS) and access to the internet. Across the developing world, there are programmes that give farmers access to research and best practices, weather information and market prices via SMS, Interactive Voice Response (IVR) or call centers.

Information and Communication Technology is ruling the world in all walks of life and access to mobile phones and internet facility is growing in India at a rapid rate in recent years. However, the access to internet based technologies have confined primarily to the urban areas. Rural communities have not been able to gain to the same extent from IT. As a means of agricultural technology transfer to farmers, information technology has had a limited impact.

Kerala State receives an average annual rainfall of about 3000 mm but with high variability. The demand for water in Kerala is mainly for drinking, agriculture, power generation and aquaculture as well as for prevention of salt-water intrusion. Currently 71 per cent is used for irrigation , 18 per cent for domestic use and the rest is for other purposes. However, Kerala is one of the States with lowest per capita water availability among the Indian states. Basak (1998) reported the per capita water availability in Kerala was only 69 per cent of that of the country in 1981 though the general perception is contrary to this.

Term ‘Scientific research’ is too broad to be explained by using one or two definitions. One should go through the different expert views about scientific research in order to internalize the concept of scientific research. In essence a scientific research is characterized by its rigor, testability, replicability, precision, confidence, objectivity, generalizability and parsimony.

Research: Uma Sekaran (2006) defined research as an organized, systematic, data-based, critical, objective, scientific inquiry or investigation into a specific problem, undertaken with the purpose of finding answers or solutions to it.

Rationally selected and contextually defined research problem is the foundation to the successful research project. If the selected research problem is not in line with the interests of the researcher, available time, resources, infrastructure & knowledge base then achieving success in research process remains highly uncertain. Consequently, in addition to hindering of professional growth of the researcher, it also results in wastage of time, money and human effort. Most importantly, it may sometimes add up incorrect knowledge into scientific base, hindering the process of scientific progress. Hence the identification of the research problem and designing the problem statement is the most important step in the research process.

Reliability deals with the dependency, consistency, stability, predictability and accuracy of the research data. In our day to day life, when we say that a person is reliable then it means his behaviour is predictable, his behaviour (the way he behaved in past, he is behaving now and the way he will behave in future) will be consistent and he is dependable. On other hand an unreliable person’s behaviour is unpredictably variable and he cannot be depended upon.

Not all the scientific problems demand the detection and establishment of causal relationship among natural phenomenon. Many of the social research problems seek to study the status quo rather than the relation between two or more natural phenomenon. Few of the impact assessment studies (which are kind of causal relationship studies to an extent) also demand for knowing the status quo before and after implementation of interventions. Many other studies demand for benchmark assessment to make policy decisions. Under such circumstances, survey research is a useful research method.

Every practical problem need not have a documented solution. Most of the times to solve a practical problem, we need to apply our experience, creativity and experiment with the novel solutions in order to address the problem which have no readymade solution. Under such circumstance, we will apply our knowledge and experience in selecting, planning, experimenting and evaluation of the possible solutions. This type of problem solving approach involves action research.  Action research is a type of social research that aims at gaining an insight into the problem by learning from experiences gained in an effort to solve the problem. Here, action itself is a source of knowledge.

Communication material is the joint product of knowledge, skill and attitude base of the communicator. Further, most of the communication done on behalf of certain organization also reflects the objective, work culture, strategy and contribution of the organization. Hence analysis of communication material is of greater relevance in exploring the trends, vision, behavior and future course of action. In this chapter, we are going to discuss the content analysis; it’s meaning and practical application.

Based on the nature and purpose of the content, there are numerous classes of scientific communications. Theses represent the class of research communications that are of great importance to the students. Thesis is part and parcel of the master’s and doctoral programme in almost every academic institution. In some institutions, even the bachelor students are expected to submit their brief report on project.

In India, majority of the people live in rural areas and are engaged in agriculture, earning a subsistence wage. Development which has been focused on them seems to have just passed by them. In India out of the 147.90 million rural households around 60 per cent are cultivation households. Eighty-eight per cent are headed by small/marginal farmers with holding less than 2 hectares (Throat, 2005). Therefore to finance this category of the poor, there is an obligation to create opportunities where credit can be used in a meaningful way.

Abstract

The Stree Shakthi Groups (SHGs) were launched in Karnataka during 2000-01 aimed at improving the overall development of rural women in Karnataka. A review of the progress achieved by these illeterate or less educated, hither to continued to be economically dependent with no voice in decision making, is nothing short of a miracle. With an enrollment of one and a half million in 5000 villages, their savings and borrowings run into hundreds of crores and employment opportunities are provided to lakhs of farm women. Apart from agriculture related activities, some of them have also involved in some unconventional, income generating activites. Economic empowerment has emboldened these beneficiaries to not only fight against social evils but also win their battles. Overall, SHGs have transformed the life of rural women treatmendously in a positive direction.

Abstract

The present study was undertaken to analyse factors contributing to participation of rural women in Self Help Groups (SHGs), constraints faced by them and to elicit their opinion to strengthen the role of SHGs. The finding has revealed that, majority of the respondents has suggested that they should be provided with loans and the rate of interest on loans should be less.  Further, they also suggested that instead of existing loan structure from the bank and saving amount within the group must be increased which can be invested on other activities. It was also reasoned that the provision of low interest loan from the banks and purchase of raw materials at cheaper rate can improve the financial status of farm women.

The World is a home to more than one billion young people aged between 15 and 24 years.  Many are unable to fulfil their potentional because of poverty, hunger, poor health and lack of education. As a result, they lack the skills needed to gain employment, with rural youth typically, but often fruitlessly migration in search of economic opportunities. However, given support and opportunities for gainful employment, young people have the potential to play a significant role in agriculture.

India has a big advantage as more than half of its population is below 30 years of age.  Indian agriculture will receive a big boost if the country takes advantage of its young population and encourage them into farm sector by making it lucrative.  It is necessary to launch a Youth for Agricultural Transformation Movement in rural India. Youth can provide demand driven services such as farm health monitoring and marketing of biological software essential for sustainable agriculture, climate-risk management, organization  of bio-parks, food parks, bio-village, bio-industrial watersheds and improved post-harvesting technology. Educated rural youth can establish Village Knowledge Centres (VKVs) to provide information at right time to farmers. Home Science graduates can establish nutrition clinics to help hidden hunger through appropriate local grains and vegetables (Swaminathan, M.S.). Why Youth in Agriculture?

Youth in India had been at the forefront of the nation’s struggle for freedom and development. There are over one billion youth in the world today. Eighty five per cent of these youth live in the developing world and around 50 per cent of the population with in developing countries live in rural areas. According to 2001 census, more than 40 per cent of the total population is between the age group of 15 to 35 which is considered as “youth” by the Government of India. Out of which, 73 per cent resides in the rural areas (Anonymous 2001). Unfortunately rural youth of today are counted among the most disadvantaged groups of society. Because of rapid population growth, widespread unemployment inadequate health, poor education, migration, lower family income and lacking adequate opportunity at farm level had led the rural youth in continued stress of self esteem and self confidence. Youth empowerment is an attitudinal, structural and cultural process whereby young people gain the ability, authority and agency to make decisions and implement change in their own lives and the lives of other people. Youth are the present and the future of humanity.

India has the second largest concentration of tribal population after African continent. The tribal population of India is more than 8 per cent of the total population (Anonymous 2001). However, in Maharashtra it is over 9 per cent of the state population. Among the tribal community Bhil community is the largest tribal population in Maharashtra. They live in compact areas, which are generally hilly and undulating terrain. The Bhil are primarily farmers, though they are said to be hunters since the past. Poor condition of soil, small holdings, poor resources and economic condition, traditional methods of agriculture do not provide them a regular and continuous sustenance throughout the year as such they have to depend on other subsidiary sources of earning.

Most of the tribal communities have to live under a difficult economy; the ways of their livelihood are limited and work very hard to get a bare subsistence. Thus, the tribal children from their early age are burdened with a number of economic duties, obligations and they can hardly be spared for school. Proportion of dropout is also higher among tribal children. In fact most of the tribal youth and school going children participate in farming and looking after the economic demands of the family.

Agricultural research in India has contributed new varieties of crops and production technologies for increased production at the national level. These modern technologies benefited only a particular section but farm youth in rainfed areas are facing many problems. One of the problems identified in the diffusion of technologies to farm youth in sustainable agriculture was the lack of appropriate technologies suitable to the farm and social situations. When farmers in rain fed areas are exposed to innovations, they react to the practices/innovations from different viewpoints. A practice appropriate to farm youth in rain fed areas must be less in cost, high in profits, less risky,  highly compatible with socio-cultural values and beliefs, less in complexity, highly trialable on a small scale and the results of the same should be easily observed and communicated. These dimensions are perceived by farmers differently and the degree to which they perceive them favourably are likely to adopt the same in rain fed areas. Many a time, several past investigations have only indicated whether the recommended package of technologies has been adopted or not by farm youth. This gives percentage of farm youth adopting the practices but not the percentage of recommended technologies adopted by them and the problems encountered by them in adopting the recommended technologies in rain fed areas.

ICT refers to tools that facilitate production, transmission and processing of information. It includes the gadgets and processes to access, retrieve, store, organize, manipulate, produce, present and exchange information by electronic and automated means. According to UNESCO (2004), Information Communication Technology includes a range of technologies starting from radio, television, up to modern technologies like mobile phone, multimedia, internet, and satellite based communication systems. Modern information and communication technologies that have resulted from a breakthrough in information technology, when applied to conditions in rural areas, can help to disseminate information, improve farmers’ knowledge, increase their participation and share knowledge with others. Information Communication Technology (ICT) is one of the yardsticks to measure socio-economic development of the country and hence effective usage and management of ICTs tools is the pre-requisite for any development. Telephone is a powerful electronic device. The number of rural telephones was increased by approximately 35 per cent per annum (Jhunjhunwala and Ashok, 2005). This impressive growth in telecommunication sector is being utilized to provide information on demand to the farming community with the establishment of “Kissan Call Centers” (KCCs).  Kissan Call Centres were launched in January 2004 across the country to provide information services to the needy farmers and answer the queries made by them through telephone. In this context, a study was conducted to find out the profile of Kissan Call Centre users.

Relevance of Gender Mainstreaming  in Agriculture

Indian agriculture is characterized by farming systems wherein men and women perform mutually interdependent as well as independent roles right from production, processing, marketing, and decision making as farmer, labourers and entrepreneurs. The extensive contribution by women in wide ranging tasks in production and processing in agriculture, influences household food security and determines national competitiveness in agro industry at large. Even though women make substantial economic contribution towards the sustenance of the farming systems and livelihood security, most often women’s roles remain invisible and their problems and needs are unaccounted and unattended. Historically dictated by social norms, family traditions and economic factors, participation of women and men in various farming contexts in India still remain gender specific and highly women discriminating. Women’s work is considered as unskilled and remains undervalued and underpaid. It is to be appreciated that at international and national level efforts of women empowerment and gender perspectives are being brought in development approaches and the situation during the past few decades is slowly changing as policies, efforts and budget are being specially allocated for the upliftment of rural farm women. But it is to be noticed that most of the programmes are of short term, narrow focussed and without continuity.

Agriculture is of paramount importance in most developing countries because large proportion of the population involved and the need to maintain national food production. It is generally accepted though not fully proven, that health and productivity are positively correlated. This is of particular  relevance because many agricultural tasks in developing countries demand high level of strenuous activity (Anonymous, 1987). Investment to improve agricultural worker’s health would be justified on both humanitarian and economic grounds. Nearly half of the available human resources in India are women.  It has been roughly estimated that women represent 50% of population and have contributed about 10% of income and own less than 1 % of the world’s property.  The population of farm women are involved in sowing, transplanting, weeding, winnowing, drying, bringing drinking water and firewood, cleaning and dehusking.  Most of the drudgery prone tasks for women in agriculture are cutting uprooting, transplanting, weeding and sowing and post harvest tasks like manual threshing of maize, millets and pulses, sieving and cleaning. For groundnut, after the harvesting, removal of nuts and cleaning of groundnut seeds are also performed  manually. Further, sieving, cleaning are performed by winnowing followed by traditional sieve. (Badiger et al. 2006).  Studies have pointed out that farm activities that are time and labour intensive, monotonous, repetitive and more drudgery prone are generally performed by women.

India is one of the countries where 90% of the small, marginal and medium land holding farm families are depending on agriculture. The average annual income of the each farm family isvery less from the agril sector. At present farmwomen play an important role in managing different kinds of farm and home activities. The entrepreneurial behaviour development among the farm family is very essential to earn the additional income to manage their family. Farmwomen not only are involved in home activities but also play a significant role in farm production. In India farmwomen take decisions in their day-to-day life in agricultural sector. However, farmwomen are greatly aided by the amount of information available to them about their felt needs.  The World Bank Report(1992) states that keeping the role of farmwomen in mind, there is a need for training of farmwomen regarding necessary dairy technologies, so that they can perform these activities with more competence.
 
The advances in information technology have brought an explosion in information flow like Radio, T.V, Internet etc in agriculture.  There is large quantity of information through various sources, channels and Website on the Internet, but the information tends to be one sided, as it is gathered from Research stations. Farmwomen seek information sources.  Therefore, a study was conducted to understand the information seeking behaviour of dairy farmwomen.
 
The study was conducted in Manvi and Deodurga taluks of Raicur district in Karnataka state to know the information seeking behaviour of farmwomen regarding dairy farming and allied sector.

The efforts to keep pace with the fast life are causing mental and physical tensions. Diversion and relaxation is needed for the revival of spirit and enthusiasm. Leisure is an unimposed free time, after the practical necessities of life have been attended to. It is the time spent in activities chosen by the individual rewarding for its own sake. Choice of leisure time activities may also depend on the regularity of free time. An activity performed during small amounts of free time may be different than the one planned for a large block of free time. The leisure activities have far reaching influence on the personality development of the youth. If these youngsters are trained to make use of their leisure time for productive purpose, their endless energies could be channelised into fruitful development work.

An investigation was carried out involving 120 rural youth from Kapasi and Mardasgaon villages in Gangakhed taluka of Parbhani district from marathwada region of Maharashtra state, to asses the leisure time utilization by rural youth.  The sample included 70 boys and 50 girls.

Profile of Rural Youth

Education : As regards the education of female youth is concerned, 30 percent of them were educated up to H.S.C. and S.S.C, level where as 20 percent of them were educated up to high school level and 10 percent of them were degree holders and educated up to middle school level.

Youth are the creative force potential and a strength symbol for every community. One of the hallmarks of the positive youth development movement is that it is built on a foundation of scientific research. In addition, youth development programs typically work through existing social organizations rather than focusing on individual counseling. The rural youth work of FAO over the years has made significant contributions to make the lives of young people from rural areas more productive and meaningful by strengthening the organizations which serve them. The needs and challenges of rural young people today are greater than they have ever been in the past. In most developing countries, youth make up well over one-half of the total rural population. Because of their number and potential impact, rural youth must be a major part of any equation dealing with immediate and long-term solutions to solving problems of food security and sustainable development. Rural youth living in rural areas get limited opportunities for educational attainment in village areas. Opportunities for vocational guidance are also limited causing them diverting towards non creative activities and for merely wastage of time. An investigation was undertaken to study the socio-economic characteristics  and leisure time activities of rural youth. The study was conducted in College Development Block comprising Hatkanangle, Radhanagari & Bhudargad Tahsils of Kolhapur district, Maharashtra. From the Tahsil, 10 villages were selected randomly.  From each village, nine rural youths were selected randomly. Thus in all 90 rural youth were finally selected for the study. 

The silkworm chawki rearing is a vital stage in rearing as it has major influence on cocoon production.  Temperature, humidity and leaf quality are the three key important factors influencing chawki rearing.  Hence, maintaining these conditions at every step is very important and calls for provision of separate chamber. Any alteration in these factors will influence during later ages of silkworm rearing leading to crop losses.  Taking these factors into consideration the Government of India promoted the establishment Chawki Rearing Centres (CRCs) in private sector also.  These CRCs brush the silkworm eggs at one point under controlled conditions and distribute the worms to the needy farmers.
 
In recent years, bivoltine hybrids are becoming more popular in India and particularly in Karnataka.  This is due to the efforts of the Central Silk Board, Karnataka State Department of Sericulture and Japanese International Co-operation Agency.  These Bivoltines have high cocoon shell ratio (24 to 25%), better quality, fetches high cocoon price, better returns, high rendita (5.1 to 6.1) and raw silk percentage (20 to 22%) with filament length of 11502 to 12200 meters.  The farmers could achieve up to 70kgs cocoon yield per 100 Disease Free Layings (DFLs) and quality silk of 2A to 4A grade. 

The pressure of population on land is increasing and the average size of a farm holding is reducing, to below one hectare. Farmers are increasingly getting indebted and the temptation to sell prime land for non farm purposes is growing. If there are other opportunities, about 40 per cent of farmers want to quit farming, says a survey conducted by National Sample Survey Organization. We hear deplorable stories of farmers ending their life not being able to cope with the loss and indebtedness from agriculture.
 
On the closer examination, we find that agricultural land is still a great source of income. But it is the practice of unsustainable methods, improper resource management leading to successive crop failure that makes agriculture non-profitable and risky. As a result, many young farmers are leaving agriculture and migrating to cities. Under these conditions, how are we going to persuade educated youth, including farm graduates, to stay  in villages and take to agriculture as a profession? How can youth earn a decent living in villages and help shape the future of our agriculture? At the same time, we also hear the stories of highly educated persons wanting to move into agriculture as their profession.
 
It is a well known fact that the recession had hit the Information Technology sector and the professionals across the globe in a big way. Some of them were ‘sacked’ and even thrown to streets as ‘loss cutting’ measures by the companies. Many qualified software professionals were forced to find an alternative job. But software professional, Sri. Kondana Chandrashekara Gatty, who was in the Information Technology field for nearly 10 years, did not feel the pinch of recession since he had switched over his carrier field from IT to agriculture. 

During his visit to India, President Barak Obama pointed out that our country is fortunate to have a youthful population with over half of the total population of 1.2 billion being under the age of 30. Out of the 600 million young persons, over 60 per cent live in villages. Most of them are educated. Gandhiji considered the migration of educated youth from villages to towns and cities as the most serious form of brain drain adversely affecting rural India’s development. He therefore stressed that we should take steps to end the divorce between intellect and labour in rural professions.

The National Commission on Farmers (NCF)(2004-06) emphasised the need for attracting and retaining educated youth in farming. The National Policy for Farmers, placed in Parliament in November 2007, includes the following goal of the new policy:

To introduce measures which can help to attract and retain youth in farming and processing of farm products for higher value addition, by making farming intellectually stimulating and economically rewarding.

The National Food Security Bill 2011, which is now on the website of the Union Ministry of Food and Consumer Affairs for public comments, aims to make the Right to Food a legal right. During the last seven years, the country has witnessed a transition from political patronage to legal entitlements in the case of education, information, work and land rights in tribal areas. When finally enacted, the Food Security Bill will be the brightest jewel in the crown of Indian democracy. Therefore, public scrutiny of the draft Bill is important. The draft Bill mentions that its aim is “to provide for food and nutritional security in human life-cycle approach by ensuring access to adequate quantity of quality food at affordable prices, for people to live a life with dignity”. Unfortunately the Bill is its present form will not be able to fulfill this inspiring objective.

The legal commitment contained in the Bill implies that every child, woman and man should have physical and economic access to balanced diet on the basis of a life-cycle approach, i.e., from conception to cremation. Nutrition security involves access not only to the needed calories and protein, but also to micro-nutrients like iron, iodine, zinc, vitamin A, and vitamin B12. In addition, clean drinking water, sanitation and primary health care are essential for ensuring that food is properly assimilated in the body.

The pros and cons of wheat imports are now a matter of public, political and media concern and debate. I have been quoted as both favouring imports and opposing it. Since this issue is a complex one with short- and long-term implications, I would like to explain my personal position.

The wheat import plan announced by the Government of India is in response to the need for maintaining adequate food stocks both for the purpose of food security and for feeding the public distribution system (PDS). Following the Wheat Revolution in 1968, Indira Gandhi decided to build a sufficient buffer stock of foodgrains under government control in order to ensure that the basic staples are available at reasonable prices even under conditions of unfavourable monsoon. She was also deeply conscious of the linkage between food security and sovereignty in foreign policy. Maintaining adequate food reserves is an absolute must from the point of view of avoiding both panic purchase and famines, particularly at times when there are indications of aberrant monsoon behaviour. Some years ago the Government of India had over 60 million tonnes of foodgrain reserves and substantial quantities were exported to reduce the cost of maintaining stocks of that order.

As it is well understood, food and drinking water are the first among the hierarchical needs of a human being. Growing population, expanding ecological footprint, diminishing per capita land and water availability, increasing biotic and abiotic stresses, and, above all, the prospects for adverse changes in temperature, precipitation and sea level as a result of climate change, emphasise the need for keeping issues relating to agriculture high on the professional, political and public agenda. The multiple roles of agriculture in food production, improving nutrition and health, and climate change mitigation are now well recognised scientifically, but are yet be integrated into coherent national policies and strategies. Opportunities for generating synergy among agriculture, nutrition and health are great and this conference is therefore a timely one.

Transgenic varieties combine genes from totally unrelated species. For example, we can now transfer genes for salinity tolerance to rice from mangroves. The recombinant DNA technology is part of the evolution of genetics starting with the rediscovery of Mendel’s Laws of Inheritance in 1900. In the early part of the twentieth century, various techniques like irradiation, use of chemical mutagens and doubling of chromosomes through colchicine treatment were adopted to develop novel genetic combinations.  Today such gene transfer can be done with both precision and ease through recombinant DNA technology. Both molecular marker-assisted breeding and gene transfer now play a very important role in developing genetic combinations to meet the challenges rising from biotic (i.e., pest and diseases) and abiotic (i.e., drought, flood, sea level rise, etc.) stresses. They will gain further importance in the emerging era of climate change. Varieties developed by marker-assisted selection are also eligible for certification under the protocol for products produced through organic farming.

In 2009, the world celebrated the 200th anniversary of the life and work of Charles Darwin, a transformational scientist who brought about a revolution in our understanding of evolution.  Evolution through natural selection among living organisms leading to the survival of the fittest was a concept which was alien to Christian thought in Darwin’s time, as faith was strong in the divine creation of the living forms of our planet.  Evolution of higher forms of life, including human beings, from fish and other forms of living organisms was an accepted view in ancient Indian thought, as exemplified by the ten forms of manifestation on earth of the Hindu god Vishnu.

“Variety is the spice of life” is a common saying.  Variation is a must for selection to occur.  Today, we are confronted with the prospect of human-induced changes in climate, leading to adverse variations in temperature, precipitation, flood and sea level.  We will have to be prepared for facing the consequences of drought, flood and coastal storms more frequently.

A climate-resilient agriculture, which we need urgently, will have to be based on a two-pronged strategy: maximising farm productivity and production during a normal monsoon period, and minimising the adverse impact of unfavourable weather as witnessed during 2009.  Unfortunately, we are yet to develop an anticipatory research and extension programme to minimise damage during unfavourable monsoon periods.  For example, the deficiency in rainfall during the southwest monsoon of 2009 was 23 per cent.  The growth in agriculture and allied sector GDP was minus 0.2.  The highest growth rate in agriculture GDP of 5.2 per cent was observed during 2005-06 when the growth in total GDP was 9.5 per cent.  Had we had a scientific monsoon management strategy, we could have minimised the loss in 2009-10.  Similarly, if we have a strategy for maximising the benefits of a good monsoon, we can hope to achieve at least 5 per cent growth rate during 2010-11 in agriculture and allied sectors.  In parts of China like the Yunnan province, which has experienced 60 per cent less rainfall than normal, there is a move to grow different crops together in the same field, thereby distributing the risk arising from monoculture. It is time to develop a pro-active monsoon management strategy.

How can we develop a sustainable water security system in an era of climate change and global warming ?  In my view, every country should develop a sustainable water security system with the following four major components.

Supply augmentation

The major sources of irrigation water are from rainfall, rivers, tanks, reservoirs and other surface water resources, groundwater, industrial and domestic effluents, and seawater.  Seawater comprises almost 97 per cent of the global water resource and is an important social asset.  With the melting of Arctic and Antarctic ice, sea level will go up with disastrous consequences. The tsunami of December 2004 gave a glimpse of what could happen in the future.  To augment supplies, we must harvest rainwater and store it carefully, both above and below ground.  Also, we should ensure that all waste water which emerges from industry and domestic use is purified and recycled.  Rainwater harvesting should become a way of life, so that it becomes everybody’s business.

There are reports in financial newspapers that the ongoing (2010) drought affecting nearly 200 districts in the country may not have much effect on GDP, since the farmers in the drought-affected areas contribute hardly 3 per cent to GDP.  It is sad that such a measure of the impact of drought on the lives and livelihoods of millions of rural families is even considered. It is this mindset, typical of the growing insensitivity to human suffering in our country, that is responsible for India being the home for the largest number of undernourished and malnourished children, women and men in the world.  No wonder we are finding it difficult to achieve the first among the UN Millennium Development Goals, namely, reducing hunger and poverty by half by 2015.  Unless we realise that agriculture in India is not just a food- producing machine, but is the backbone of the livelihood of over 60 per cent of our population, rural deprivation and suffering will not only continue to persist, but will get worse, leading to severe social unrest.

Food is basic to human being and agriculture is the catalyst between the two which is basically supported by natural resources. The human being is entirely dependant on food and food is fully dependent on agriculture and humanity. Eventhough food, agriculture and humanity have their own entity; they are inseparable for the survival and existence of each other. Hence, the three pillars of food, agriculture and humanity forming a triangle symbolize the roots of human civilization.

I find myself fortunate to have the opportunihj to live and experience the working life of the farmers and the farming in Kansas (USA), Nigeria (Africa), Saudi Arabia and Yemen (Middle East), Italy (Europe) and India, Myanmar and Thailand (Asia). It zvas fiirther strengthened by visits to farmers in another about 100 countries. Day after day and month after month and even years, it made me to realize that community culture, language and farming in each state, country and continent are different from each other but some things are common and that they are all doing farming, they are growing food and they all doing for the livelihood of their families, neighbors and communities near and far (Nath, 2011).

The foundation of agriculture is laid on available natural resources e.g. land, water, sunlight, air, plant, animal and human beings. The human beings, being the leader to manage the resources have contributed to redefine agricultural science and promote and develop technology. This has led to augment agriculture and its science and technology. At the end, the human efforts have brought about changes and improved agriculture production at the cost of excessive use of natural resources, knowing well that without natural resources, without good soil and water hardly anything will survive.

Presently world produces enough to feed the present human population, but it is not available to millions of people. It is not the lack of availability of food but is the unequal distribution and lack of entitlement which are causing hunger and malnutrition in millions of population.

• Agriculture Information Systems
• Major Trends
• Agriculture Information System
• Importance
• Internet Based Agriculture Information System
• Support Provided by Agriculture Information System
• AGRIS/CARIS
• AGROVOC
• Agriculture Research Information System (ARIS)
• Agriculture Research Information Center

• Introduction
• Characteristics of Management Information System
• Management Information Systems Advantage
• Outputs of a Management Information System

Of all kinds of resources; financial, natural, physical and human resources, the most critical resources for any endeavor are the human resources involved in it. Physical, natural and economic resources are important for facilitating development of any nation but the most important are the human resources. Human resources are the most significant of all the resources to convert all other available resources into production and economic entities. Capable, efficient and motivated human resources can bring about the tremendous positive change towards progress. No doubt, it is equally true that inefficient people can wither away a whole empire and squander away its precious wealth and abundance. People are the real wealth of nations.

Resource appraisal is very significant for micro-enterprise development especially in rural areas. A developing economy like India needs entrepreneurs who are competent to perceive new opportunities and are willing to incur the necessary risks in exploiting them. Rural areas are infrastructurally poor and to take up any entrepreneurial venture in such a scenario appears to be enormous to the simple farmer who has been engaged in cultivating the land in a traditional manner. Developing agri-enterprises is needed urgently to enhance the productivity and incomes of the farmers from their ever shrinking agricultural lands.