A Study on the Psychological Impact of Covid-19 on Farmers

Abstract

With the implementation of total lockdown of the nation in response to the COVID-19 pandemic by the government, it had unintended but detrimental effects on farmers and supply chains for agricultural commodities, which aggravated the farmers problems and disturbed them psychologically. Hence the study was undertaken to assess the Psychological, societal and economic impact of COVID-19 on farmers. The study was conducted using Ex-post facto research design in Raichur and Kadapa districts of Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh. Based on the diversity of crops grown and land type possessed by farmers, 9 taluks with 12 villages and 15 farmers from each village were selected, thus sample size of 180 was taken. A scale was developed to measure the psychological impact of farmers using 8 components and data was collected. The results indicated that, (38.89%) of the irrigated land farmers faced high psychological impact, followed by (35.56%) and (25.56%) farmers faced medium and low psychological impact. Among the dry land farmers, (38.89%) were under medium impact, followed by (32.22%) and (28.89%) facing low and high psychological impact. The overall impact on all the farmers showed that (37.78%) were belonged to medium psychological impact, while (33.89%) and (28.33%) faced high and low impact respectively.