Extent of Knowledge and Adoption Level of Farmers about Improved Technologies on Cashew Based Dryland Farming System

The present research was taken up to assess the extent of knowledge and adoption levels of recommended cashew cultivation technologies by cashew farmers. The study was conducted with three villages each from Sendurai and Jayamkondam blocks of Ariyalur district with a sample size of 120 respondents. Majority of respondents had medium level of knowledge and adoption of recommended cashew cultivation technologies. Majority of the respondents had knowledge about recommended variety, season, recommended intercropping, quality of good planting material and time of harvest. Most of the respondents had medium level of adoption about recommended cashew cultivation practices. Nearly half of the respondents adopted manuring, propagation, stem and ischolar_main borer management, and tea mosquito bug management. It could be observed from the above findings that the low level adoption was found in the technologies viz., preparation of field, recommended pit size, shoot caterpillar management and pink disease management. Majority of the respondents (50-58%) had low level of overall knowledge and adoption of recommended practices of blackgram. In the case of gloriosa cultivation, majority of the farmers (60-62%) had medium level of knowledge and adoption of recommended cultivation practices.