Gaining an insight into problems of millet farmers in Assam

Millets, often referred to as "nutri-cereals," are of tremendous importance due to their rich nutritional profile and adaptability to adverse climatic conditions. Despite their ability to thrive in challenging environments such as drought, high temperatures, and infertile soil, millet cultivation faces several obstacles. This research aims to investigate the problems encountered by farmers in millet cultivation. The study, titled “Gaining an Insight into Problems of Millet Farmers in Assam’ adopted a descriptive research design and employed a multi-stage, purposive-cum-random sampling technique to select 120 respondents from eight sampled villages in the Golaghat district of Assam. Data were collected using a pretested, semi-structured research schedule with the personal interview method. The findings revealed that farmers faced several significant challenges which are categorised under nine major areas such as: personal problem, social problem, inputs related problem, managerial problem, production problem, economic problem, market related problems transportation problem and post harvest technology problem. These problems tend to collectively hindered the adoption of improved cultivation practices and affected the overall profitability of millet farming. Problem confrontation index (PCI) was employed as a statistical measure to know the extent of seriousness of problems.