International Journal of Agriculture Extension and Social Development

author(s)
Hem Prakash Verma, ML Sharma, MA Khan, PK Pandey and Eshant Kumar Sukdeve

abstract
In India, small and marginal farmers together own 86.21% of the nation's total land holdings. 13 FPOs (2 from Northern Hills, 9 from Chhattisgarh Plains and 2 from Bastar Plateau) have been selected for the study. For the study, 20 members were selected randomly from each FPOs. In this way, 260 (13x20) members were selected for in-depth study. The result shows that less than half (39.62%) of the FPO members had taken the middle school level of education, followed by 31.54 percent of them who had taken the primary level of education. The majority of FPO members (55.77%) had less than five family members. FPO members were male (63.85%), and the remaining 36.18 percent were female. Most (61.92%) of the respondents had received any training, but only approximately one-third, i.e., 38.08 percent, had not received training. Less than half (47.69%) of the FPO members had Rs. 1,00,000 - Rs. 2,00,000 of annual income, followed by 31.92, 11.92, and 5.38 percent having up to Rs. 1,00,000, Rs. 2,00,000 - Rs. 3,00,000, and Rs. 3,00,000 - Rs. 4,00,000 of annual income, respectively. Nearly more than half (64.62%) of the FPO members had a medium level of risk orientation, followed by 24.62 percent of them having a high risk orientation, and 10.77 percent having a low level of risk orientation. More than half (56.54%) of the FPO members had medium leadership ability, followed by 26.15 and 17.31 of them having low and high leadership ability, respectively.