T. R. Ramakrishnan* and Dr.K.Puttaraju**
Abstract
Many have disagreed that a mere ICT enabled infrastructure that has tools to access information rich database is not enough to implement a good communication system in the community. One needs a good number of participants to use the tools. The purpose of this study is to empirically analyze how people develop social structures using online communication and collaboration tools, and to test how an individual and group behaves in the new technology driven social structures.
This research is focused on the transformation process of the tech savvy farmers. It examined the formation of VRC’s at Bengaluru district and the change of collaborative learning and working networks. In order to understand how this collaborative network function and factors influenced the way farmers became included in the new media social structure, the study tested among people in friendship networks and the individual communication styles.
Further, the study was extended to get a feedback from people using the VRCs. It examined the effects of using such networks on the achievement of the objective of the VRCs as facilitation collective information sharing of scientific farming community and enhancing farmers development and satisfaction.
The study tested hypothesis using surveys and field experiments. It has collected data from participant farmers of VRCs and non-participant farmers at Bengaluru district. The result supports the hypothesis, that is, it found that the tech savvy farmers were influenced by friends circles and communication styles, and the new method of exchanging information affected the way they communicate among the group and the way they shared knowledge with all members of VRCs using technology enabled systems.
The findings confirm that it is important to analyze these members of VRCs to understand how a new community is created and how new members are included and their relationship with the old traditional social structure for discussions about information related to farming. It highlights on the outcome on the confidence level of the farmers using ICT tools for information access. The result confine quite back in time to the structure of having field officers and field workers to communicate by teaching and assisting from introduction to usage of information access and use of scientific knowledge for farming using ICT tools.
Keywords: VRC, ICT, communication, farmers, agriculture
**Dr.K.Puttaraju(Guide), Chairman, Department of Communication, Bangalore University
* T.R.Ramakrishnan(Author), Lecturer(SBMJC-CMS) and Research Scholar, Department of Communication, Bangalore University
