ACTORS INFLUENCING WOMEN PARTICIPATION IN HOMESTEAD POULTRY REARING IN NARAYANGANJ DISTRICT OF BANGLADESH

Abstract

The present study was undertaken to determine the factor influences the participation of rural women in poultry farming and to identify reasons, consequences and constraints to participation in two villages of the Narayanganj district of Bangladesh. A total of 80 rural women was randomly selected from two villages of Araihazar upazila of Narayanganj district. From the study it was found that majority of the respondents belong to the age group of 36-50 years, 48.8% was married, 57% women had nuclear family, 33.8% of the respondent’s average monthly savings was between 1000 to 3000 taka, and majority of the respondents (62.0%) rear chicken. Binary logistic regression analysis was used to identify the relationships between the nine factors and the participation of rural women in poultry practices. The major findings of this study revealed that family size, husband’s occupation and communication device like television positively influenced women participation in homestead poultry rearing. Besides, primary and secondary education level negatively influenced women participation in homestead poultry rearing. On the contrary, age, marital status, type of family, average monthly income and smartphone had no significant effect on women participation in homestead poultry rearing. Respondents marked source of income as 1 st reason to participate in poultry rearing followed by rearing to supply food to their family in the 2 nd ranking and meat production in the 3 ranking. Insufficient fund, cultural/traditional belief, poor management skill and poor access to training facilities were the major constraints to women participation in poultry rearing. Most women thought respects from husband & children, independent decision making authority and consideration of their views for household decisions improved greatly due to participating in poultry.