Relationship between Socioeconomic Characteristics and Usability of Online and Mobile Media among Farmers of Punjab

The present paper is an endeavour to analyze the accessibility and usability of online and mobile media among farmers and to find out the relationship between socioeconomic variables and various online and mobile media. The primary data were collected from randomly selected 720 farmers from 16 villages of Punjab through self-structured questionnaire. The findings of the study indicate that 99.17 per cent of farmers in the study area had access to mobile phones while 78.05 per cent farmers were using internet on their mobile phones. However, 60.56 per cent farmers had used agri-apps and agricultural websites to obtain agricultural information. Only 43 per cent of them had positive perception towards the usefulness of information attained through online and mobile media. Further, there was a positive correlation of socioeconomic characteristics such as education, income and land with usage of online and mobile media whereas age and experience had shown negative correlation. This implies that with the increase in age and experience of farmers, the possibility of using mobile and online media for agricultural information declined whereas higher education, larger landholdings and more income facilitated greater use of mobile phones and internet for agriculture purposes. Thus, the socioeconomic characteristics of farmers had a direct and deep relationship with the accessibility and usage of online and mobile media among farmers of Punjab. The study recommends that a policy should be framed to educate the elderly farmers regarding the use of the new media. The scope of formal education among the youth should also be expended to realize the full potential of this medium.