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Capacity Strengthening of Rural Women in Performing Post Harvest Activities of Guava: an Assessment of Need

M.Z. Rahman
Professor
Department of Agricultural Extension Education, Bangladesh Agricultural University, Mymensingh

M.S. Hoque
Lecturer
Dept of Agril Extension and Rural Development, Patuakhali Science and Technology University, Dumki, Patuakhali

A. Begum
Deputy Director
KGSK, BAU, Mymensingh

S. Akhter
Former MS Student
Department of Agricultural Extension Education, Bangladesh Agricultural University, Mymensingh

Abstract/ Executive Summary:

Determining the extent of need for capacity strengthening of rural women to perform post harvest activities (PHAs) of guava and to explore the relationship of selected characteristics of the rural women with their extent of need for capacity strengthening were the main focuses of the study. Fifty women were randomly selected for data collection from Kuriana village under Nesarabad upazila of Pirojpur district. A pre-tested interview schedule was used to collect data from the respondents in April 2008. Most of the women (76%) had high and 24% of them had medium and none of them had low extent of need for capacity strengthening in PHAs of guava. All the women had the highest extent of need for capacity strengthening in management skill and need for physical facilities. The women had the highest (83.87%) need for capacity building in physical facilities and their lowest extent (75.67%) of need was for capacity building in decision making ability. Most (62%) of the respondents had medium training need for all of the activities while 24% and 14% of them had high and low training need, respectively. Age of the respondents had significant positive relationship while ability to cope with uncertainty and daily time allocation had significant negative relationship with their extent of need for capacity strengthening. The focal problems faced by the women in using the PHAs of guava were lack of training on PHAs, poor transportation and absence of women group in the locality.

Keywords: Need assessment, Capacity building, Post harvest activities, Guava

Location: Nesarabad upazila of Pirojpur district

Start Date: 00-04-2008

End Date:

Program Area: Postharvest and Agro-processing

Commodity: Guava

Objectives:

To assess the need for capacity strengthening of rural women in performing PHAs of guava.
To assess their training need regarding PHAs of guava.
To explore the relationships between eleven selected characteristics of the women with their need for capacity building for practicing post harvest activities of guava.
To find out the problems faced by the women in using the post harvest facilities in guava production.

Methodology:

A randomly selected sample of 50 rural women involved in guava cultivation was taken for data collection. A pre-tested and structured interview schedule was used to collect data during April 2008. Eleven characteristics of the women were considered as independent variables which were age, education, dependency ratio of the family, farm size, annual family income, organizational participation, decision making capacity in the family, training exposure, credit received, ability to cope with uncertainty and daily time allocation. Need for capacity strengthening of rural women towards PHAs of guava was the dependent variable of the study. To measure the extent of need for capacity strengthening of women five dimensions of capacity strengthening were included. They were: a) need for financial ability, b) need for decision making ability, c) need for access to support services, d) need for management skill, e) need for physical facilities. The dimensions were measured on a four-point rating scale. Scores were assigned as 0, 1, 2 and 3 for ‘no’, ‘low’, ‘medium’ and ‘high’ respectively. The scores of all items of each dimension were added to obtain the total score of a single dimension. Finally, scores of all the five dimensions formed the total score of the extent of need for capacity strengthening of women for a respondentThen total score was converted to percenrt.To measure problem of participation in PHAs of guava, Scored Causal Diagrams (SCDs) were used (Galpin et al., 2000). Various problems of participation were listed through discussion with the respondents. Assuming the end problem `low participation in PHAs' writing it on the ground drawing circle at the center and arrows were drawn to represent the causal relationships between the problems. The causes of those problems were identified and added to the diagram. The problems at the edge of the diagram with no identified `causes' were determined as the `root' causes. Scoring was done by the importance from the end problem by dividing them between the causes of each subsequent problem.

Source of Information: Bangladesh Journal of Extension Education, Volume 22, No. 1&2, 2010:111-118, ISSN 1011-3916

Article Link (Online Journal):

Funding Source:

Total Budget (Tk.) :

Achievement/Findings:

The current research revealed that two-thirds of the respondents (76 percent) had high and nearly one third (24 percent) of them had medium extent of need for capacity strengthening in PHAs of guava. Appropriate and specific on-the-spot training may be arranged for the women on various aspects of capacity scale-up to carry out the PHAs of vegetables and fruits. To train the women, extension agents should be trained first to improve ‘training of trainers’ (TOT)’ on courses relevant to the PHAs. Such courses might be included in the diploma in agriculture so that the field level officers of DAE can also learn themselves in detail about PHAs of vegetables and fruits. Furthermore, the relevant academic institutions and capable NGOs may be integrated in the process of strengthening capacities of rural women in performing PHAs in better ways. More nutritional aspects may be included in the courses at school level so that even less educated women can be aware of the issues. Rural women with small farm size and less annual income, exposed to uncertainty and having little capital should be given priority regarding enhancing their capacity strengthening in PHAs. Need based training, better facilities near hand to preserve guava and well developed transport system can improve involvement of women in PHAs in guava as well as can unlock opportunities for rural women to get their right share in economy. The key problems faced by the rural women in participating the PHAs of vegetables and fruits are to be resolved on priority basis by concerned agencies of the government.

Knowledge Management: Journal