Post-adoption behaviour of farmers towards soil and water conservation technologies of watershed management in India

Abstract

The Indian Institute of Soil and Water Conservation (IISWC) and its Research Centres have developed many successful model watershed projects in India in the past and implemented many Soil and Water Conservation (SWC) technologies for sustainable watershed management. While many evaluation studies were conducted on these projects in the past, there has been no assessment of the post-adoption status of the SWC technologies over a longer period. It was imperative to appraise the behaviour of the farmers with regard to the continuance or discontinuance of the technologies adopted, diffusion or infusion that took place and technological gaps that occurred in due course of time in the post watershed programme. Therefore, it was realized that the postadoption behaviour of beneficiary farmers who have adopted different soil and water conservation technologies for watershed management projects should be studied in detail. The research study was initiated in 2012 as a core project at Vasad as the lead Centre along with IISWC headquarter Dehradun, and Centres Agra, Bellary, Chandigarh, Datia, Kota & Ooty, with the specific objectives of the study to measure the extent of post-adoption behaviour (continued-adoption, discontinuance, technological gap, diffusion and infusion) of farmers towards the adopted SWC technologies of watershed management. In the present study various indices regarding continued adoption, dis-adoption (discontinuance), technological gap, diffusion, infusion regarding soil and water conservation technologies for watershed management were developed for measurement of post-adoption behaviour of farmers. It was revealed that a little less than three-fourth (73%) of SWC technologies continued to be adopted and more than onefourth (27%) were discontinued by farmers. Out of the total continue adopted SWC technologies by farmers, a little less than onefifth (19%) of technologies continued to be adopted with a technological gap. More than one-fourth (28%) of SWC technologies were also diffused to other farmers' fields in nearby villages and on an average 1.2 technologies were also infused into the farmers' fields from outside by their own efforts in the watersheds developed by the IISWC and its Centres.

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Water Security in a Changing Environment: Concept, Challenges and Solutions

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“…List of reviewed papers and their relation with seven different dimensions of water security. Small-island communities in the Philippines prefer local measures to relocation in response to sea-level rise Household, Resilience to water related disaster [51] Solutions to water resource scarcity: water reclamation and reuse Economic, Urban, Environmental [52] Occurrence and risk assessment of emerging contaminants in a water reclamation and ecological reuse project Environmental, Safe or desirable water quality [53] The potential of water reuse as a management option for water security under the ecosystem services approach Economic, Environmental, Safe or desirable water quality [54] Post-adaptation behaviour of farmers towards soil and water conservation technologies of watershed management in India Economic, Environmental [55] How is ecosystem health defined and measured? A critical review of freshwater and estuarine studies Economic, Environmental [56] Rivers as Socioecological Landscapes Environmental dimension [57] Connectivity in rivers Environmental dimension…”

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