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Farmers’ Attitude Towards Sustainable Agricultural Practices

Mithun Kumar
MS Student, Department of Agricultural Exttension and Rural Development, Bangabandhu SheikhMujibur Rahman Agricultural University (BSMRAU), Gazipur - 1706, Bangladesh

Ghosh Shaikh Shamim Hasan
Department of Agricultural Exttension and Rural Development, BangabandhuSheikh Mujibur Rahman Agricultural University (BSMRAU), Gazipur – 1706

Abstract/ Executive Summary:

The main purpose of this study was to determine attitude of the farmers towards sustainable agriculture. The study was conducted in two villages (Tejrol and Rajapur) of two different unions of Sadar Upazila of Jessore district. Ninety respondents were selected following two-stage proportionate random sampling technique during January to March, 2012. Compilation and interpretation were done as per objectives of the study. Findings indicated that majority of the respondents (48.9%) were young aged, had primary level of education (34.4%), had small farm size (85.5%) and large family size (51.1%). The respondents had low extension contact (82.2%), medium farming experience (45.6%) and they had low cosmopoliteness (45.6%). It was also found that majority of the respondents (51.1%) had low knowledge. They showed medium attitude (65.6%) towards sustainable agricultural practices. Moreover, level of education, farm size, annual income, cosmopoliteness, extension contact and knowledge had positive and significant relationship with the attitude of the farmers towards sustainable agriculture. The results of the study showed that the higher the socioeconomic status (more frequent contact with extension services, higher education, ownership of land, etc.) and the greater the access to information, the greater the perceived importance of sustainable agricultural practices. It is concluded that if policy-makers and extension organizations concentrate on these factors, they are more likely to succeed in making farmers more favorably disposed toward sustainable agriculture.

Keywords: Attitude, Sustainable Agriculture

Location: Two different unions of Sadar Upazila of Jessore district

Start Date: 00-01-2012

End Date: 00-03-2012

Program Area: Knowledge Management

Non-commodity: Database Management

Objectives:

1. To determine the selected socio-demographic characteristics of farmers; 2. To determine the attitude of farmers towards sustainable agriculture; 3. To explore the relationship between selected characteristics of the farmers and their attitude towards sustainable agriculture.

Methodology:

Lebutala and Ichali union of Jessore Sadar upazila of Jessore district were selected as the locale of the study. All farmers of Tejrol village of Lebutala union and Rajapur village of Ichali union were the population of the study. At first two villages, Tejrol and Rajapur were selected randomly from two unions. Total number of farm families in Tejrol and Rajapur were 334 and 267 respectively. 50 farmers from Tejrol village and 40 farmers from Rajapur village were selected as sample following two-stage proportionate random sampling technique. Thus the total number of sample respondents was 90. Face to face interviewing by using structured interview schedule was used to collect data and the entire process of data collection were done from February to March, 2012. Measurement of dependent variable - Farmers’ attitude towards sustainable agricultural practices was considered as the dependent variable of this study. Farmer’s attitude was measured by asking his opinion upon 25 attitudinal statements on sustainable agricultural practices. 5-point Likert type scale was used for this purpose. Score 5 was assigned to strongly agree statements, while 4, 3, 2 and 1 was assigned for agree, neutral, disagree and strongly disagree statements respectively. In case of negative attitudinal statement, reverse score was assigned to each response. Based on the computed scores the respondents were classified into three categories according to Salawat et al., 2013, i.e., low attitude (up to 82 scores), medium attitude (83 to 106 scores) and high attitude (above 106 scores). Measurement of independent variables - The independent variables of this study were farmer’s age, education, family size, farm size, annual income, farming experience, cosmopoliteness, extension contact, and knowledge. Age of a farmer was measured on the basis of actual age of his life and expressed in years. The education was measured by the number of years of schooling. Family size was measured by the total number of members including the farmer himself, spouse, children and other permanent dependents who lived together as a family unit. The total land area possessed by the farmer under farm and homestead was the basis of measuring farm size in this study and it was expressed in acre. The yearly income of the farmer from different sources was the annual income of the respondent. Farming experience was determined by the duration of experience of a farmer in agricultural works and expressed in years. Farmer’s visit to different places outside of his own village was the basis of cosmopoliteness score measurement. For measuring extension contact of the farmer, a four-point scale i.e, not at all, rarely, occasionally and frequently was used and appropriate weights were assigned to quantify the variable. Twenty one questions were selected in the interview schedule for measuring farmers’ knowledge on sustainable agricultural practices. The score assigned against each item was 2 for fully correct answer, 1 for partial correct answer and 0 for incorrect answer. Weight for responses on the 21 questions of a farmer were added together to get his score for on sustainable agricultural practices. Necessary tables and categories were used to classify the data considering their nature and distribution. As per the objective of the study, statistical tests like frequency counts, percentage, mean, standard deviation were used for analysis and interpretation of data. Correlation coefficients were used for hypothesis testing and 0.05 and 0.01 level probabilities were used as the basis for exploring relationship between the concerned variables throughout the study.

Source of Information: BANGLADESH RESEARCH PUBLICATIONS JOURNAL; ISSN: 1998-2003, Volume: 8, Issue: 4, Page: 227-234, July - August, 2013

Article Link (Online Journal):

Funding Source:

Total Budget (Tk.) :

Achievement/Findings:

Most of the farmers of the study area were young aged, having large family size, small farm holding and had primary level of education with low to medium annual income and medium farming experience. Most of them had low extension contact, and low cosmopoliteness. More than sixty percent (65.6%) of the respondents had medium attitude towards sustainable agricultural practices compared to 21.1 % having low attitude and 13.3% had high attitude towards sustainable agricultural practices. The findings revealed that farmers had a moderate attitude towards sustainable agricultural practices. This might be due to the fact that a considerable proportion of the farmers had not enough training exposure, moderate use of source of information and low extension contact. Coefficient of correlation test indicated that education, farm size, annual income, cosmopoliteness, extension contact and knowledge showed positive significant relationship with the attitude of the farmers towards sustainable agricultural practices, that means higher the above-mentioned characteristics of the respondent, higher was their attitude regarding sustainable agriculture.

Knowledge Management: Journal