Assessing Farmers’ Awareness and Adoption of Soil Health Cards (SHC) in Guntur District of Andhra Pradesh, India

Abstract

The present study was conducted with an objective to study the farmers’ perception and adoption of Soil Health Card (SHC) in Guntur district. A total of 90 farmers were selected for the study. The results revealed that majority (45.56 %) of the respondents were in 36 – 54 years age group with primary school education (40.00 %) and farming as a sole occupation (74.44 %), with more than 30 years of experience in farming (50 %), having land holding of 1 to 5 acres (38.89 %) with annual income of 1 lakh to 2 lakh (45.56 %), neighbors (41.11 %) as major source of information, nuclear type of family (95.56 %) with family size up to 5 members, having occasional information seeking behaviour (71.11 %), had no membership in any organization (90.00 %) and majority of them used complex fertilizers (93.33 %) in their farming. It is evident from the study that Majority of the farmers had medium (56.67 %) level of perception followed by high (28.89 %) and low (14.44 %) level perception. Whereas, in case of adoption of soil Health card results, majority of the farmers had low (45.56 %) level of adoption followed by medium (36.67 %) and high level of adoption (17.78 %) respectively. In order to give healthy soil for future generations, todays’ farmers need to practice Integrated Nutrient Management practices with optimum fertilizers as per the SHC results is inevitable. Which not only retains the soil fertility but also provides sustainable income for the farmers.