The study analyses the changes in farming system and socio-economic impacts at the household level through “before-and-after” (longitudinal) comparison of adopters and “with-or-without” (cross sectional) comparison between adopters and non-adopters.
The broader research questions center on -
The study establishes that the water saving technology for minor irrigation not only saves water, energy, and labour inputs but also increases the farm income through higher production per unit of land. Though labour is saved for some agricultural operations but the introduction of the technology has provided an impetus to other ancillary occupations like emergence of large numbers of cold storages for potatoes, and dealerships of micro-irrigation equipments.
The study concludes that introduction of water saving technologies is like a ‘turning point’ for the farmers of the water scarce area in the long run cultivation system.
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