FOOD SECURITY STATUS OF FISHING HOUSHOLDS IN KISHOREGANJ

Abstract

Food security is mostly important for all the living people especially in the rural or under developed area where people are not conscious about food and nutrition. The study briefs out the existing issues of food security in haor area of Nikli Upzila. The overall objectives of this study were to examine the present socioeconomic status of the fishing household, which factors were constraints for food security and identified the problems of accessing foods in Nikli Upazila of Kishoreganj district. A total of 110 sample respondents were interviewed by using simple random sampling techniques. Both descriptive and inferential statistics were used to analyze the data. Socioeconomic status and problems faced by the respondents were assessed by using descriptive statistics and presented in tabular form. The extent of dietary diversity which was used to assess the food security status was assessed using descriptive statistics also. The factor determining the food security status of the small scale fishing community at Nikli Upazila was assessed using binary logistic regression analysis. After analyzing the respondent data, result showed that the average family size of sample households was 5.32 and 69.09 % of the survey respondents were found to have no education. Besides among the respondents 59.09 % hold yearly income from BDT 160000-190000. After analyzing, it was found majority of the expenditure spent on food items which hold 55.3 % of total cost. The result showed that age of the respondent, food expenditure, education, access to information having loan were significant factors those affect food security status of the fishing households. Various issues like climate change, population growth, increasing cost of food, uncontrolled market etc. were found to be encountered by respondents in the research region when attempting to obtain food. The respondents ranked the increasing cost of food items as the most serious problem among the six challenges. Therefore, it is highly needed to emphasis government support to ensure the food security.