Effectiveness of Voluntary Organisations in Hill Agriculture: a Participatory Action Research in West Bengal, India

Darjeeling Hills of West Bengal, India has many challenges in farm sector. The high rainfall induced hilly terrain poses many challenges to the otherwise resource constrained farming community. The farm productivity is low compared to the potentials. The absence of institutions at the grassroots for transfer of technology emerges to be the main constraint. The public sector organisation in rural development and especially in agriculture in Darjeeling hills lack grassroots linkages for transferring technology. The Farm Science Centre (Krishi Vigyan Kendra) is a front line transfer of technology project (Farm Sector) of Indian Council of Agriculture Research (ICAR). The voluntary organisations and/or Non Government Organisations have potentials to be an active player in farm technology transfer. The present book traces the potentials of voluntary organisation in forging linkage with public sector organisation through participatory mode of program planning and implementation in farm sector. The present study is premised on action research mode with the support of need based application of participatory tools.