INFORMATION NEEDS OF THE TRIBAL FARMERS IN AGRICULTURAL ACTIVITIES OF DINAJPUR DISTRICT

Abstract

The purposes of the study was to determine the extent of information needs of the tribal farmers in agricultural activities, to determine the selected characteristics of the tribal farmers and to explore the relationship between information needs and selected characteristics of the tribal farmers. Data were collected using an interview schedule from a sample of 90 tribal farmers out of 180 following simple random sampling procedure from Sadar upazila under Dinajpur district. Besides the usual descriptive statistical parameter, Pearson‟s Product Moment Correlation Coefficient (r) was used for statistical analysis. The information needs was determined by 15 selected agricultural activities. A 4-point rating scale was used for computing the extent of information need of a tribal farmer which was assigned as „high‟, „medium‟, „low‟, and „not at all‟ weighting the score as 3, 2, 1 and 0, respectively. It was revealed that exactly three-fifths (60.0 percent) of the tribal farmers had medium information needs while 27.8 percent had low and 12.2 percent had high information need. Result also revealed that statements “control of insect pest in paddy field” and Information Need Index (INI) value of 217.7 and ranked first leaning pig shed” is the last ran ed agricultural activities with INI value of 48.8. Based on the computed correlation coefficients (r) among the seven selected characteristics of the tribal farmers, three namely farm size, agricultural knowledge and attitude towards information needs in agricultural activities showed significant and positive relationship with the information needs by the tribal farmers. The rest of the characteristics of the tribal farmers viz. age, family size, annual family income and loan received did not show any significant relationship with information needs.