Study on Utilization Pattern of Indigenous Technical Knowledge (ITK) among Farm Families in Patna District of Bihar

Author: Ashish Anand, Syed H. Mazhar, Sweta Sahoo, Smaranika Mohanty and Soumya Sakti Dash

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Abstract

Indigenous technical knowledge has been traditionally owned wisdom from time to time, but as the years passed owing to the evolution of modern technologies, it is likely to be forgotten by the society. Due to ecological imbalance and exploitative use of land, water and other natural resources, their ecology is disturbed which ultimately brings down agricultural productivity. There is a poor alliance between the practice of traditional and modern knowledge. An appropriate association between the traditional and modern knowledge and technology systems has immense potential to benefit the society. Regarding this, the present study was conducted in Patna District of Bihar to find out the “Utilization pattern of Indigenous Technical Knowledge (ITK) among farm families”. A total of 120 respondents were selected randomly for the present study. The data were collected through a pre-structured interview schedule and appropriate statistical analysis was done to find out the utilization pattern. Eleven ITK practices was selected to quantify utilization pattern by farm families. It was observed that use of “Bijamrut” was most prominent ITK practised among farm families. Regarding utilization level, it has been found that majority of the respondents (70.83%) were having medium level of utilization pattern followed by low (15.00%) and high (14.17%) level. These results will be of much help to policy makers to document these ITK practices for sustainable food production. There are some challenges related to the present study i.e., the study was confined to the Sampatchak block of Patna district of Bihar only, which is a very small proportion of the state in respect of geographical area hence, may be considered a micro study. Also, findings of the present study will be helpful in providing scientific explanation to the experientially generated knowledge and age-old farming practices, of which utilization rate must be high.

Keywords

Association, Documentation, ITK, Level of utilization, Pre structured interview schedule, Quantify

Conclusion

Present study focused on assessing the association between socio economic profile and utilization level of ITK among farmers. It was found that use of Bijamrut was most prominent ITK practised among sampled ITK practitioners. It was also observed from the study that majority of respondents i.e. 70.83 per cent had medium level of utilization of ITK.

References

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How to cite this article

Ashish Anand, Syed H. Mazhar, Sweta Sahoo, Smaranika Mohanty and Soumya Sakti Dash (2023). Study on Utilization Pattern of Indigenous Technical Knowledge (ITK) among Farm Families in Patna District of Bihar. Biological Forum – An International Journal, 15(1): 248-251.