Impact of Agriculture Skill Council of India sponsored trainings on knowledge and adoption among poultry farmers of Himachal Pradesh

Sharma, M., Thakur, D., Suman, M., Ahuja, R. and Khurana, S. 2024. Impact of Agriculture Skill Council of India sponsored trainings on knowledge and adoption among poultry farmers of Himachal Pradesh. Indian Journal of Poultry Science, 59(3):337–340. The present study assessed the effectiveness of Agriculture Skill Council of India sponsored long duration poultry farming trainings on knowledge gain and adoption among the trainees. Knowledge test was administered to 40 trainees (20 in each batch), before and after the one month long training programmes in 2018–19 and 2019–20. Based on the scores obtained, trainees were categorised into low, medium and high knowledge categories. Majority of the trainees were below 40 years with education up to higher secondary level. Sizeable proportion of trainees belonged to scheduled castes and other backward classes. Majority had experience in poultry farming prior to training. All the trainees passed the third party assessment organised by ASCI and got their certification. Pre training, majority (75%) of trainees had medium level of knowledge. Post training, cent per cent trainees moved to high knowledge category. The gain in the knowledge was found to be statistically significant at 1%, measured through paired t test. Majority of trainees showed positive change in terms of adoption of recommended practices in their flocks after the training. Thus, it is concluded from the study that the training programmes are excellent extension tools for the capacity building of the farmers and usher them towards poultry entrepreneurship.