Abstract
The purposes of the study were to determine the extent of participation of the sharecroppers in farm decision-making on sharecropped land and to explore the relationships of selected characteristics of the sharecroppers with their participation in farm decision-making. The study was also aimed to determine the influence of the selected 16 characteristics of the sharecroppers on their participation in farm decision- making. Four aspects of crop farming, namely (i) crop and variety selection, (ii) land preparation, sowing and transplanting, (iii) fertilizer and water management, and (iv) crop protection, harvesting and post-harvest activities were considered for farm decision making. Interview schedule, Focus Group Discussion (FGD) and Key Informant Interview (KII) were used as the tools for data collection. Data were collected from a sample of 240 sharecroppers selected by multistage random sampling procedure from eight unions of Phulpur upazila under Mymensingh district during May 2012 to August 2012. The average participation indices of the aspects crop and variety selection, land preparation, sowing and transplanting, fertilizer and water management and crop protection, harvest and post harvest activities were 0.56, 0.72, 0.61 and 0.67 respectively. The overall participation indicated that a large proportion (58.70 per cent) of sharecroppers had medium participation in farm decision-making, while 41.30 per cent had high participation. The average overall participation index was 64.19. Among the 16 characteristics of the sharecroppers- agricultural knowledge, extension contact, organizational participation, dependency on crop farming, and farm size had significant positive relationship with their participation in farm decision-making. All these six characteristics also had significant positive influence on their participation in farm decision-making. Only landowner relation of the sharecropper had a significant negative relationship with their participation in farm decision-making and this characteristic also had a significant negative influence on their participation in farm decision-making. Stepwise multiple regression analysis indicated that these seven characteristics jointly explained 34.70 per cent variation in sharecroppers' participation in farm decision- making. Only eight types of sharecropping arrangements were operating in the study area. The most preferred sharecropping arrangement was fifty-fifty output sharing by the landowner and the sharecropper with half seedling, half irrigation cost, half fertilizer and half pesticide cost shared by the landowner. From FGD, KII and secondary data it was evident that true sharecropping is decreasing day by day. Fourteen causes of decreasing sharecropping were identified. Three of them were, low return from sharecropping, availability of alternative IGAs and leasing land is more profitable than sharecropping. Ten problems to participate in farm decision-making by the sharecroppers were also identified; the most important one was sharing more inputs by the landowner.