Participation of school dropouts in farming and non-farming activities for their livelihood maintenance

The study focused on the participation of school dropouts in farming and non-faming activities for their livelihood maintenance. The study was conducted in Gauripur and Muktagacha upazilas under Mymensingh district. Out of 855 male school dropouts, 220 were selected as the respondents from 10 government primary and 10 non-government secondary high schools following true cohort analysis and appropriate sampling procedures. Data were collected during October 2005 to December 2007 by using both qualitative and quantitative methods. The extent of participation was measured on frequency of performance, part of work done, control over decision against selected 100 farming and non-farming activities. The school dropout rate, perceived factors responsible for dropout, problem confrontation and preference in farming and non-farming activities were also determined. The relationship between the selected 16 characteristics of the school dropout with their participation in farming and non-farming activities was also explored. The rate of dropout in primary school was 46.45 percent and in high school was 77.47 percent, which is higher than the national average. Overwhelming majority (77.7 percent) of the primary school dropouts and 83.70 percent of the secondary school dropouts were from farm and labor based households respectively. The shortage of cash money to incur education cost was perceived as major factor for school dropout. The school dropouts were mainly involved as family worker in farming and non-farming activities. They had almost equal access to all activities available in rural areas. In case of farming activities the highest (29.68 percent) of them were involved in vegetable cultivation and the lowest (12.27 percent) in fish culture. For non- farming activities, the highest participation (2.71 percent) was found in small business and lowest (0.19 percent) in construction activities. As regards to overall participation, the majority (84.1 percent) of the respondents fell in medium participation category, while 10.0 percent was in low and 5.91 percent in no participation category. All the characteristics of the dropouts had significant positive relationships with their participation in farming and overall activities except length of dropout, family size and attitude towards education, while agricultural mindedness and time spent showed significant positive relationships with participation in non-farming activities. The cosmopoliteness, agricultural knowledge, migration mindedness, time spent and family farm size of the dropouts had higher direct effects on their participation in farming and non-farming activities. The participation model indicates that 47.54 percent of the total variation on the participation was explained by these predictors. The major farm activities preferred for participation were food and cash crop cultivation, cattle rearing, and beef fattening while for non-farm activities, services, small business, and agricultural mechanics were preferred. The major problems confronted by the respondents were lack of ready cash for farm investment, inadequate family land, lack of improved farm knowledge, irregular supply of electricity, inadequate vocational training facilities, lack of industrial establishments in the rural areas etc. Organizing special extension program for the school dropouts, leasing khash land and water bodies to the dropouts, capacity building through farming and vocational training and broadening the safety net programmes could increase level of participation and improve the livelihood of the school dropouts.