Agricultural Extension with Information and Communication Technology (ICT)Mediated Open Distance Learning (ODL) Methods: A Case Study from Rural South India

Drought is increasingly becoming a cause for concern in many regions of South Asia, because recurrent droughts often cause large-scale water and food deficits, hunger, famine, exodus of people and animals, diseases, deaths, and many other severe, chronic socio-economic problems. The degree of vulnerability to the impact of drought varies significantly from one nation to another. Many of the rural communities appear to forget the miseries of one drought season with the onset of good rains; and those miseries usually continue from one drought to the next. This is due to lack of awareness and non-availability of the relevant information. There is an urgent need for sustained information, communication, education and social mobilization among strategic sectors, especially the most vulnerable rural communities and their intermediaries, to improve agriculture and to mitigate the effects of drought. Drought preparedness is preferable to relief, and information is the backbone of drought preparedness