Vol. 12, Special Issue 11 (2023)

Author(s):
Jayalaxmi B Pawar, Surekha Sankangoudar and Rajeshwari N

Abstract:
The study was conducted to know the extent of participation of farm women in value addition activities of tomato in Kolar district. A sample of 300 tomato growers were purposively selected from five taluks of Kolar namely Malur, Kolar, Mulbagal, Srinivaspur and Bangarpet. The data was analysed using frequency, mean, percentage and correlation test was used to find out the relationship between variables. It was found that the participation index of respondents was high in Harvesting (67.42%) followed by grading and sorting (54.08%), storage of fresh fruit (37.00%), marketing (22.92%), packing of fresh fruits (19.33%) and transportation of fruits (8.33%). The overall participation index of respondents in post harvest activities was to the extent of 69.00. This is because, post harvest activities like harvesting, grading storage are usually performed by women folk to a large extent as these involve light and less muscle power. The study also revealed that 78.67 percent of the respondents were found under low participation in value addition category followed by 17.33 percent under medium and only four percent were found under the high participation in value addition of tomato. The overall participation index of farm women in value addition activities of tomato was low to the extent of 28.83. This was due to lack of knowledge about value addition and absence of processing units in the district. Therefore, there is an urgent need to organize interventional programmes to empower farm women for sustainable livelihood.