Thrissur: Scientists in the field of agriculture should come out of their self- imposed shells to interact with other stakeholders and extend hands-on training in practical agriculture to the farming community, Farm Minister V. S. Sunil Kumar said. Speaking after inaugurating a function held at the College of Horticulture, Vellanikkara, to launch four new Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCS) developed by KAU’s Centre for e-learning (CeL) the other day, the minister said that more such courses and training programmes should be formulated to guide the farming community.
“KAU, which has the requisite expertise and know-how, should take up the responsibility of guiding farmers in adopting and adapting to technologies. Since the agricultural technologies are developed in KAU labs, this University has the right and responsibility to propagate them. For example, public interest in organic farming has to be reciprocated with scientific inputs- theoretical and practical- and who else better than KAU has the know-how to do it. If this is not done, unscientific practices will spread and the farmers will suffer,” he said.
He also called for optimum use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) to strengthen agricultural development programmes. The Minister also said that the government was promoting the use of ICT in the department network. “Digital networking of agricultural offices is being strengthened to enable prompt interaction between all stakeholders,” he added.
