Survey-Based Study on Farmers’ Knowledge and Pattern of Using Insecticide on Different Crops in Aligarh District of Uttar Pradesh, India

: Background: Agrochemicals can play a significant role in enhancing post-harvest crop productivity and protection. But over the years, there’s growing concern about the inaccurate use of pesticides in agriculture. Objective: To assess knowledge of farmers about pest management, perceptions of the kind and frequencies as well as severity of pests and disease, sources of information, awareness of farmers and safety measures followed during pesticide application. Methods: A random survey was conducted employing a standard structured questionnaire among 100 farmers in Wheat, Mustard and Paddy cultivating areas across the ten villages of Aligarh district, Uttar Pradesh, India. Results: Most ordinarily used pesticides applied by the farmers on different crops were Malathion, Cypermethrin and Chlorpyriphos. It was also observed during the survey that most of the farmers stored the pesticide bottles at safe places and the remaining in unsafe areas with no safety measures. It was found that no farmer was familiar even with Government Central Insecticides Board and Registration Committee (CIBRC)’s roles and guidelines about the use of labeled and unlabelled pesticide application. However, most of the farmers were mainly dependent by the recommendation of pesticide dealers.


Introduction
In India pests and diseases cause damage on an average 18-20% of crop cultivated by the farmers every year. Due to the rising population and decreasing cultivable land, demand for food grains is increasing at a faster stride when compared to its production. Crop losses due to these harmful organisms can be substantial and may be prevented, or reduced, by crop protection measures. 1 Adequate knowledge on how farmers perceive pests, their attitude, and practices to crop protection problems are required to implement successful pest control programs. 2 Therefore, it is required to adopt more simple steps for crop productivity enhancement as well as crop protection methods.
Agriculture is the main occupation of the farmers in the study areas and has an important place in the economy of the district. Farmers of 10 villages of Aligarh i.e.,Amroli, Chandekha, Chereth, Sudyaar, Kalupura, Siya, Ratgao, Palla, Mirzapur and Manzorgadigrow wheat, mustard, paddy, maize, sugar cane and other season crops as well as off season crops vegetables. These crops are damaged by various insects, pests and diseases and cause reduction in yield. Use ofpesticides can increase crop productivity by 25-50%, by reducing crop loss due to pest attacks. Thus, crop pesticides are also very essential to ensure food and nutritional security.Crop pesticides, poisons chemical substances used in certain circumstances to kill specifically targeted pests. 3 Though strict regulations have been laid  down by both international agencies like EPA and  WHOand national agencies like India's Central  Insecticide Board and Registration Committee  (CIBRC) and Food Safety and Standard Authority  of India (FSSAI), which work for the insecticides  manufacturing,  formulation  and usage, however, farmers overlooked thedesireddose, favourabletime and frequency of application of these pesticides. 4 At the same time, farmers donotgive much attention to the requisite safety measures to be adopted and the recommended mode of application for different kinds of commonly used pesticides particularly in developing countries. Chemical pesticides are the most effective, shortterm control method for a variety of crop pests and pathogens but their ailing effects on human, animal and environmental health have also been well accepted. Chemical pesticides tend to persist in soil, surface water as well as ground water for long periods thus imposing serious health threat for humans and animals. 5 Apart from affecting the target pest, they also influence the native micro and macroflora of the agricultural soils and water. 6,7 A numbers of ecological functions and properties are adversely influenced by pesticides such as nutrient cycling, natural food webs and food chains, soil structure and fertility, soil and water biodiversity, natural balance between pest and predator insects and many others. 8 However, if proper care is not taken, pesticides can harm the environment by contaminating soil, surface and groundwater, and ultimately kill wildlife. 9 We are living in an environment that is polluted not only by heavy metals, pharmaceutical chemicals but also by pesticides. [10][11] It is required to develop compoundsnaturally and synthetically that are capable of interfering with the processes of growth, development and metamorphosis of the target insects. One of the alternatives may be the inclusion of insect growth regulators (IGRs) in pest control programmes. 9 There are only a few studies associated with these issues in India. Thus, a study focused on pesticide application practices and usage trends is highly required toknow the farmer's perception. This investigation was, therefore, undertaken to assess various aspects of pesticide usage patterns, farmer's views in pest knowledge and management in cultivating different crops in villages of Aligarh District, Uttar Pradesh, India.

Methods
A survey-based study was conducted to collect the information on various aspects of pesticides usage like knowledge of farmers about pest management, perceptions of the kind and frequencies as well as severity of pests and disease, sources of information, awareness of farmers and safety measures followed during pesticide application.
The study was doneacross the 10 villages of Aligarh i.e., Amroli, Chandekha, Chereth, Sudyaar, Kalupura, Siya, Ratgao, Palla, MirzapurandManzorgadi. The studywas conducted face to face with farmers at the place of their crop field and resident using a standard structured questionnaire in the vernacular language spoken and understood by the farmer. 100 farmers(10 farmers from each Village)were interviewed in which 35 were in the agegroup of 25-35 years and 65 were in the age group of 35-50years. The farmers were not informed to avoid biased responses and to gain actual insight of the farming practices.
These farmers were divided based on land ownership. A household that has more than 10 acres of land were considered 'Large Farmer'; between 4 acres and 9 acres were 'Medium Farmer'; less than 4 acres as 'Small/Marginal Farmer' and with no land as 'Landless Farmer'. The landless farmers take a rented field for cultivation of crops and earn profit by selling crops and managing their home.
The uses of labeled/unlabelled, intensity and composition of pesticides used by farmers are kept in mind to have a better insight into farmers' pest management practices in crop production. Farmers' pest control practices, sources of information on the adoption of pesticide use and decision criteria were conducted. In addition to this, information regarding sources of information of toxicity levels, storage, disposal, application practices, sprayer maintenance, safety measures followed was also examined at the study site.
Percentages and averages were computed and compared using MS-excel and SPSS (16.0 version) to draw meaningful inferences.

Results
The present survey-based study was done after randomly selecting farmers of different crops, cultivating areas of Aligarh. Among the 100 interviewed farmers, 53 percent had received no formal education, 30 percent were educated below secondary level and 12 percent were educated up to secondary level and only 5 per cent had acquired a higher degree. The average ages of the interviewed farmers were between 35 years to 45 years of age ( Table 1).
The Indian cropping pattern is exclusively within the world because it is characterized mainly by the paddy-wheat cropping pattern. The findings of the survey suggest that different types of crops are grown based on seasons and suitability of farmers. Basically, farmers are interested in growing two different types of crops annually, but sometimes they grow more than two crops in a year. Types of crops grown are totally dependent on quality of soil, irrigation supply, climatic condition and on the farmer wellbeing (Table 2).
Farmers buy the insecticides from the nearby places. They are more fascinated to get insecticides at lower cost. This way, they want to save both money and time. The pesticide dealer sells the insecticide to the farmers without any scientific reasoning (Table 3). Farmers were found using different equipment for introducing insecticides in the agricultural field, such as majorly tanks (capacity 20-25 litre of water), manual and electronic sprayers, etc.
Overall, 10 insecticides were found as most frequently used by the farmers. A region wise analysis on the use of fertilizers reveals that insecticides are being used most in study areas. Malathion was known to be the most effective and popular insecticide followed by other insecticides such as chlorpyriphos. Insecticides like imidacloprid and methyldemeton were also used to control sucking pests of sugarcane which acts as systemic ( Table 4). The use of insecticides in agriculture is still essential to achieve adequate control of pests and desired production. However, applying large quantities of insecticides is most common, to ensure the result, without taking into account that this practice normally entails an excessive release of harmful products that make the environment unfit and increases production costs.
Farmers take only primary action to store, dispose and safety measures for use of insecticides. Most of the farmers stored the pesticide bottles in their houses. Only a few farmers adopted safe disposal methods like crushing/burying the empty containers into the soil. They resold or reused the empty bottles of pesticides after washing them properly, especially large size containers. It was also found that very few farmers used selfprotection such as like face masks/hand gloves, etc, and rest of the applicants did not use any safety measures (Table 5).
In the survey conducted, it was observed that farmers had limited knowledge of pest management as well as the consequences of pesticide use in crop cultivation. About 35.3 per cent (average) or more of farmers were not aware of the hazards of insecticides and 70 per cent mainly dependent on the advice of pesticide dealers, followed by relatives/friends as well as information from the public. 50 per cent were not recognizing the pest which causes damage to their crops (Table 6). They are only interested in increasing their yield and saving their crop from insects. In some villages, farmers take advice from private instructors or advisers who have knowledge about different pesticides and for these, farmers must pay for the advice.
The knowledge about IPM and Biological control practices was also examined. On an average 33.2 per cent farmers are here about the IPM and said that they are willing to achieve the IPM techniques, but they don't have a proper knowledge about that and good financial conditions (Table 6).     Note: All figures are in percentage. Note: All figures are in percentage. We found Malathion as the most popularly used insecticide followed by Chlorpyriphos in the surveyed area. It was reported by the farmers that they are interested in buying cost effective, easy availability of Insecticides. Majority of the farmers tend to use Insecticides even before the onset of crop damage by Pest and they follow a continuous application of pesticides throughout the crop season up till harvesting. Due to poor financial conditions farmers are unable to use the equipment and leading to the continuous exposure of high concentrations of toxic chemicals, as a result acute as well as chronic health problems were associated by the interviewed group of famers.
It is an important to control the impact of pesticides on the environment and reduce the risks associated with their application. We studied the actual need of the dose of pesticides, knowing their level of toxicity, required for which type of crop and what time it uses should be known is one way to achieve the goals. Pesticide Management is the regulation of the import, manufacture, export, sale, transport, distribution, quality, and use of pesticides with a view to control pests and minimizes the contamination of agricultural commodities by pesticide residues. Study of mode of action is helpful to prevent development of Insecticide resistance in the target pest and development of pest resistance can be avoided or delayed by rotating Insecticides that work through different modes of action. To minimize the number of insecticides to be applied in a treatment of crops, it is required to study the relationships between the quantity/quality of deposited active ingredient, how it is deposited and how it affects the control of the pest.
There are few serious issues which need more attention to strengthen the domestic pesticide industry and safe application practices of pesticides. Firstly, it is important to regulate and encourage the use of cost-effective and environment friendly Insecticides. Hazardous pesticides should be avoided because of its adverse impacts. The second important consideration is the promotion of safe application practices and awareness of Insecticides among farmers. Data on use of IPM and Biocontrol agents are scanty. It is required to provide basic and advisory services and farmer's organizations with adequate information about IPM strategies and methods. Farmers are disappointed with the overall condition of farmers in India.
Even though the government of India affirms to have introduced many schemes and policies to enhance their condition, the farmers feel that only rich farmers got the benefits of government schemes and policies related to farming. Only few believe that poor and small farmers have got the benefit from related schemes. The data, described in this paper, on benefits and environmental-health risk assessment studies may be regarded as a tool towards a more understanding of the problems related to global use of insecticides.