ICT: A paradigm shift in promotion of agricultural products

Abstract

The usage of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) in agriculture is becoming an increasingly emerging trend in enhancing the rural development especially in enhancing agricultural production, improving markets and building as well as strengthening farmer capacities, creating enabling environments thereby bringing about a gradual change resulting in a complete make-over. In order to manage the informational and knowledge needs of the stakeholders efficiently, ICT’s or systems that can deliver accurate, complete, concise information in time or on time should be applied for getting information and knowledge for making decisions and one that is client-focused, high quality, needs-driven, relevant, beneficial, one that contains actionable content, is user-friendly, interactive, credible, reliable, instant, efficient, helpful, easy to access, suitable for networking and disbursement of services that are cost-effective, well protected from unauthorized access, allows for user feedback so that the systems can respond to emerging needs and to improve the message and delivery options apart from its availability in relevant formats-language, print, softcopy have become the need of the hour. With this background, the present paper is an earnest attempt to analyze the usage of ICT’s in agriculture.