Management Activity of Farm Women in Imbulpe DS Division in Sri Lanka: A Household Level Analysis
Keywords:
Women empowerment, sustainable development, gender equity, farming activities, Sri LankaAbstract
Women empowerment and gender equity are two important aspects of the sustainable development of a country. As Sri Lanka is on the way towards sustainable development, this study was conducted to assess the situation of women farmers’ empowerment in Imbulpe Divisional Secretariat (DS) division of the country. A sample of 145 women farmers was randomly selected for the study, from five selected Grama Niladhari (GN) divisions. Data was collected from a field survey using a pre-tested, self-administered questionnaire survey from April to July 2019. Empowerment was analyzed using the empowerment framework used by Rahman and Naoroze in 2007 in the study of “Women Empowerment through Participation in Aquaculture” with necessary modifications. Data analysis was conducted using descriptive statistics, correlation analysis and multiple linear regression analysis.
Results revealed that majority of the women farmers were middle aged, married and had children. Furthermore, most of them had education up to secondary level. While average family size was four, average farm size was 1.25 acres. They had around 16 years of farming experience. The average monthly income of them was 25,000.00 LKR whereas 20% of it was from agriculture. The main sources of empowerment of women farmers were the Agrarian Service Center (55%) followed by village organizations/societies (30%) and microfinance institutions (26%). Furthermore, women empowerment index was 0.65. It is a moderate level of empowerment. However, there were women farmers under only three categories of empowerment levels: low empowerment (4.1%), medium empowerment (58.5) and high empowerment (36.1%). Out of the socio economic factors; age, education, family size, land size, number of training programs participated, monthly income, experience in agriculture and number of organizations participated, education and number of training programs attended had significant and positive effect for the empowerment. Therefore, proving of timely important agricultural education and training programs, better micro finance programs and agricultural credit facilities will be able to enhance the empowerment level of the women farmers of this area furthermore.
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