E-extension- C.Thatchinamoorthy Agricultural Extension

E-EXTENSION
Mr.C.THATCHINAMOORTHY
Ph.D., Research Scholar
Department of Agricultural Extension
Faculty of Agriculture
Annamalai University
tmthatchupeaceful@gmail.com

E-EXTENSION
 E-Extension is also known as cyber extension.
 It is defined as the ‘extension over cyber space’. But,
in applied context of agriculture, cyber extension means,
"using the power of online networks, computer
communications & digital interactive multi-media to
facilitate dissemination of Agrl. Technology”.
 It includes effective use of ICT, national & international
information networks, internet, expert systems, multi-
media learning systems & computer based training
systems to improve information access to the farmers,
Extn. workers, research scientists & Extn. managers.

 To accelerate agricultural growth
 To expand knowledge resource
 To facilitate better information access
 To supplement inadequate technical manpower
 For stronger research-extension – Client system linkage
 To develop efficient feedback mechanism
 For cost-effective extension delivery
 To develop knowledge managers
 To ensure gender equity in technology transfer process
 To empower small and marginal farmers
 To serve the farm stakeholders beyond technology transfer
role
NEED FOR E-EXTENSION

E-extension
Use of ICTs has been put forth for:
 Bridging the knowledge deficit among farmers
 Enhancing the capabilities of extension personnel,
and
 Strengthening the research-extension-farmer
linkages.

INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY
 Information: Is data that have been put into a
meaningful and useful context and communicated to
a recipient who uses it to make decisions.
 IT: It is refers to computer based technology and
telecommunications. These are electronic systems
for receiving, processing, storing, retrieving and
transmitting information.

ICT
 Information and communications technology (ICT) is
often used as an extended synonym for information
technology (IT).
 The term ICT is also used to refer to the convergence
of audio-visual and telephone networks with
computer networks through a various linking
systems.
 ICT covers any product that will store, retrieve,
manipulate, transmit or receive information
electronically in a digital form.

CONCEPT
 Information and Communication Technology (ICT)
consists of three main technologies. They are:
Computer Technology, Communication Technology
and Information Management Technology. These
technologies are applied for processing, exchanging
and managing data, information and knowledge.

 Access to the astounding store-house of information is
free
 The information is available instantaneously round the
year and twenty four hours a day,
 Communication can also be interactive
 The information is available from any point on the globe
 The communication is dynamic and ever growing.
UNIQUE FEATURES OF ICT

DEFINITION
 ICT has no universal definition, since "the concepts, methods
and applications involved in ICT are constantly evolving on an
almost daily basis.
 According to Wikipedia (2008), the term ICT is the broader
term of Information Technology (IT), to explicitly include the field
of electronic communication, in addition to IT.
 The term IT is defined as “the study, design, development,
implementation, support or management of computer- based
information systems, particularly software applications and
computer hardware.” IT deals with the use of electronic computers
and computer software to convert, store, protect, process, transmit
and retrieve information, securely.

MEANING
 ICTs or Information and Communication
Technologies are emerging as an important tool for
the development of societies and have driving forces
in the economies world- wide.
 ICTs are no more confined to assist high- end
research and development; the new technologies
have made significant improvements in the life-
styles and the efficiency- levels of all sectors of
economy.

Cont…..
 The agriculture sector is gearing itself to make optimal use of the new
information and communication technologies. At the Government of India
level, a number of important initiatives have been taken to provide IT
Hardware and connectivity to all organizations involved in Agricultural
Education, research, development and dissemination.
 Simultaneously, Agricultural content development initiatives have been
taken by Ministry of Agriculture, in collaboration with National Informatics
Centre (NIC), to provide marketing information of various agricultural
commodities to the farming community.

Cont…..
 Another content- creation and aggregation initiative is being supported by Indian
Council of Agricultural Research, National Agricultural Innovations
Project (NAIP), International Crop Research Institute for Semi-Arid
Tropics (ICRISAT) have been roped in to guide National Agricultural Research
System to design, development and implement Knowledge Management
Systems (KMS) in Agriculture.
 ICTs are thus emerging as very important tools for Agricultural Extension, and it is
now a must for every Agriculture graduate to have working knowledge of
computers, Communications, Internet and World -Wide Web.

Application of ICT in Extension Education
 There are various ICT tools or applications available
to simplify the operation for general purpose use to
mission critical applications. The general purpose
applications can be used to simplify the day-to-day
operations in the organization. The following range
of ICT tools (applications) is available for the general
purpose use.

ICT application
 Word processing applications – used for preparing
text documents
 Presentation software – used for preparing
presentations
 Spreadsheets – used for calculation and preparing
tabular data with calculations
 Databases – used to store the information in the form
of records and retrieving information using query
mechanism

Cont…..
 Multimedia – used to organize the information
more meaningful manner with the help of text,
images, animation, audio and videos
 Web Browsers and E-mail – used to searching
information and sending or receiving mail using
Internet

Word Processing
 Word processing software is used to manipulate a
text document, such as a resume or a report.
 Creating, editing, saving and printing documents.
 Copying, pasting, moving and deleting text within a document.
 Formatting text, such as font type, bolding, underlining or
italicizing.
 Creating and editing tables.
 Inserting elements from other software, such as illustrations or
photographs.
 Correcting spelling and grammar.

Presentation software
 Presentation software is a category of application
software that is specifically designed to allow users to
create a presentation of ideas by stringing together
text, images and audio/video. The presentation tells
a story or supports speech or the presentation of
information.

Spreadsheet
 Microsoft excel is a powerful spreadsheet that is easy
to use and allows you to store, manipulate, analyse
and visualize data. It also supports data bases,
graphic and presentation features. It is a powerful
research tool that needs minimum of teaching. It not
only makes statistics enjoyable, it also brings live to
numerical work.

Databases
 Databases are collection of records, each record
describing an entity such as book, journal, article or
any other document or object in a machine readable
form. They can be available on a range of media such
as magnetic tapes, floppies, computer hard disks,
CD- ROMs and video discs.

CD-ROMs
 CD-ROMs are special laser
based information storage
media.
 In CD-ROM the data is
greatly compressed or
compacted and that it can
only be read and not written.
You can retrieve the
information contained in it,
but cannot add any new
information; it is really a boon
for developing countries like
India where access to on-line
services is very much limited.

Interactive computer video technology
 One of the most popular multimedia technologies
that has been used in ICVT, It links the computer to
audio-video reply in such a way as to provide the
trainee with individualized truly interactive
instruction.
 ICVT can contribute to resolving problems of
relevant farm information and improve the quality of
extension services.

Interactive video disc
 IVD is one of the popular multimedia technologies,
there is a video Disc player which access the video
images stored on a two- channel audio-disc. Other
media of information are text, graphics, animation
and digitized audio which supplement the audio on
the video disc.
 The cost of multimedia is probably the biggest issue
that will be raised. However the cost drops.
Proportionately as the number of users get
increased.

IMCD
 Interactive multimedia compact disc (IMCD) is one of
the most versatile audio visual medium of
communication. It is very efficient, accurate, quick and
somewhat cheaper in the field of disseminating the
agricultural technologies from research system to the
farmers.
 Multimedia communication is the representation,
storage, retrieval and dissemination of machine
processable information expressed in multimedia such as
text, voice, image, audio and video.

Computer – assisted instruction
 CAI is a natural outgrowth of the application of the
principle of programmed learning.
 The computer can store a massive amount of
organized information, which can be made available
for individualized instruction to meet the needs of
the particular learner.
 CAI can be arranged for teaching up to forty
thousand learners simultaneously.

Main advantages of ICT tools
 Through ICT, images can easily be used in teaching
and improving the retentive memory of students.
 Through ICT, teachers can easily explain complex
instructions and ensure students' comprehension.
 Through ICT, teachers are able to create interactive
classes and make the lessons more enjoyable, which
could improve student attendance and
concentration.

Main disadvantages of ICT tools
 Setting up the devices can be very troublesome.
 Too expensive to afford
 Hard for teachers to use with a lack of experience
using ICT tools

E-extension- C.Thatchinamoorthy Agricultural Extension

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E-extension- C.Thatchinamoorthy Agricultural Extension