Perceived Utility and Users’ Satisfaction about Information Provided by Rice Knowledge Management Portal (RKMP)

Abstract

Present world is observing the vast of information availability in public as well as private domain. With the advent of information technology, the world is getting much competitive. Information and communication technologies have been establishing themselves for so long as the futuristic tools for technology dissemination. In process of reaching up to the ultimate users in agrarian system, Indian Council of Agricultural Research, with the help of Indian Institute of Rice Research, Hyderabad has developed Rice Knowledge Management Portal (RKMP) to provide all the information related to rice. The present study was conducted with the purpose of studying perceived utility and users’ satisfaction about information provided by RKMP. The research was conducted in purposively selected districts of Nalgonda in Telangana and West Godavari of Andhra Pradesh, and simple random sampling technique was used to select the respondents. Ex post facto research design was used; data was collected using semi-structured interview schedule. Responses upon perception about the content of the portal by various stakeholders were collected using Likert-type scale. It was found that 57.5% of the farmers strongly perceived that RKMP content is related to improved cultivation practices, 56.7% of the scientists strongly perceived that content is in simple language and 70% of the extension personnel moderately perceived that content is free of spelling errors. Satisfaction with information provided in RKMP revealed that 51.3% of the farmers were mostly satisfied with the adequate content. A percentage of 66.7 scientists were mostly satisfied with the adequate content, whereas 73.3% of the extension personnel were strongly satisfied with the timeliness of information provided by RKMP. The finding will help in restructuring and incorporating necessary modification for reaching the unreached for effective dissemination of information and making portal more effective for users to ensure timely and relevant information.