Constraints in dairy husbandry being perceived by the dairy farmers in Sabarkantha district of Gujarat

Abstract

The study was conducted in purposively selected “Sabarkantha” district of Gujarat. The district is comprised of eight talukas, out of which three clusters were selected randomly. The selected clusters were Himmatnagar, Prantij and Idar. Further, five villages from each selected cluster were identified. From each village, 10 respondents were selected randomly. Thus, the entire sample size consisted of 150 respondents from selected fifteen villages in three clusters of the district. It was observed that constraints perceived by dairy farmers according to RBQ value the constraints for providing good sheds for animals were high interest rate on burrowed capital (28.66 per cent) and lack of adequate space (24.66 per cent), whereas for feeding practices there were high cost of feed (30.66 per cent), lack of knowledge of balancing ration (24.66 per cent), lack of awareness about treatment of poor quality straw to improve its nutritive value (16.66 per cent), non-availability of green fodder round the year (12.0 per cent) and lack of knowledge about silage preparation (11.33 per cent). It was suggested that simultaneous and cumulative efforts be made by the govt. and related agencies to overcome these constraints.