AGRICULTURAL WASTE AWARENESS AND UTILIZATION FOR HEALTHY ENVIRONMENT AND SUSTAINABLE LIVELIHOOD

The result have shown that majority of the farmers were of middle age group (36-50 years), educated up to metric, belonged to joint family with 4-6 members, performed only farming and had land holing up to 5 acres. Result pertaining to awareness indicated that awareness about the utilization of biogas plant waste, mushroom waste, wheat waste, mustard and horticultural waste was more than 70 percent. Awareness about utilization of paddy waste, sugarcane waste, cotton waste, floricultural wastes, poultry waste and livestock waste was between 50 to 60 percent. Thus, overall awareness about utilization of agricultural waste was very high. The result revealed that utilization of agricultural waste by the farmers was very less. None of the farmers exploited the wastes fully; waste utilization of wheat, paddy, sugarcane cotton and mustard crop, horticultural crops and floricultural crops was very low. Waste utilization of mushrooms, livestock and poultry was medium and biogas waste utilization was high. The result showed that there was a huge gap between the awareness and utilization of agricultural waste. The farmers must understand that there is nothing waste in agriculture, everything can be converted into something useful.