Abstract

A study conducted in Telangana region of Andhra Pradesh in 1998 revealed that majority of the cotton farmers possessed medium level of knowledge on cotton cultivation and fell under medium adoption category. Cotton farmers had requisite knowledge on the basics of cotton cultivation like varieties, seed rate, spacing, time of sowing, dosages of fertilizers to be applied, reasons for the use of nitrogenous fertilizers, important pests and their control measures, synthetic pyrethroids, diseases of cotton, types of sprayers to be used and optimum number of irrigations to be given to cotton crop. The level of knowledge ranged between 10-38% in the prime areas of cotton cultivation like plant protection measures, input use, integrated pest management and recommended number of sprayings of synthetic pesticides while the adoption level was very high for these items. The practices like application of potassic fertilizers, chemical, control of leaf spot, chemical control of weeds and shedding of floral parts were totally not adopted.

Keywords: Knowledge, Adoption, Cotton cultivation, Farmers and Survey