Socio-Economic Status of Pineapple Growers in Moulvibazar District of Bangladesh

Abstract

Socio-economic indicators are significant for determining the overall lifestyle of the Pineapple Growers. The study examines the different socio-economic variables of the pineapple farmers. The researchers selected the Sreemangal upazila of Moulvibazar district purposively and primary data was collected through a structured questionnaire during 2017-2018 cropping season from one hundred pineapple growers (small, medium and large) following simple random sampling technique. Descriptive statistics include frequency, sum, average, percentage and ratios were used to analyze the data. The study revealed that majority of the farmers were in small (44 percent) and medium (30 percent) categories and average farm size was 2.130 ha. Most of the pineapple growers were middle aged (31-40 years old) while a little portion of them were older aged (greater than 60 years).  It was found that 81 percent of the respondents were married in the study area.  In addition, almost all farmers (95 percent) were literate and more than sixty percent of them had primary education. Averagely, a family consists five members and above three members are dependent to their family in the study areas.  Majority of the respondents had 11-20 years of farming experience and the primary occupation of them (91 percent) was agriculture including pineapple cultivation. Moreover, a significant portion of farmers received training from government agricultural extension office whereas around one sixth of pineapple farmers received credit from both public and private banks as well as from NGOs. However, Extension office need to provide more and effective training facilities to the pineapple farmers for profitable production, simplification of buying, selling, renting and leasing of land to reduce production cost as well as different incentive packages can be introduced by the government for encouraging unemployed youth people to engage in pineapple production.