LIVELIHOOD IMPROVEMENT OF FARMERS THROUGH PARTICIPATION IN SERP PROGRAM

Abstract

The study aimed at exploring the livelihood improvement of the SERP program participants and finding out the relationships between some of the selected characteristics of the farmers and their livelihood improvement. Data were collected by using a pre-tested interview schedule from the farmers of four unions under Atwari upazila of Panchagarh district. Data were collected from randomly selected 103 respondents of the total 1030 SERP beneficiaries by using simple random sampling method from 17 May to 25 June, 2014. The selected nine (9) characteristics of the farmers such as age, education, family size, farm size, annual income, training experience, agricultural knowledge, extension media contact and organizational participation were considered as the independent variables where livelihood improvement of the fac constituted the dependent variable. Livelihood improvement of the farmers was measured by 5 point modified Likert scale. It was found that the observed score of livelihood improvement of the participating farmers ranged from 51 to 101 in score while the possible range was 45 to 225. The mean livelihood improvement score was 81.83 with a standard deviation of 9.43. Among the farmers, 66.0 percent belonged to medium status of livelihood improvement status while 14.6 percent of them had high status of livelihood improvement and 19.4 percent had low status of livelihood improvement. The variation regarding different assets of livelihood was minimum, the highest status of livelihood improvement was observed in case of natural capital and it was the lowest in case of social capital. Four (4) out of nine (9) selected characteristics of the farmers are education, farm size, annual income] and agricultural knowledge had significant positive relationships with their livelihood improvement. Rests of the characteristics are age, family size, training experience, extension media contact and organizational participation had no significant relationship with their livelihood improvement.