Major Challenges of Agricultural Practices in Northwestern Bangladesh: Peasants’ Perspectives

Abstract

The rural poor of Bangladesh are overwhelmingly peasants. The country has tripled its food production with a wide expansion of the food market since its independence in 1971, and has made an enormous progress in the economic sector over the last decades. Despite all these advancements, peasants face numerous challenges in making a sustainable living. This paper focuses on peasants' perceptions of key challenges facing peasants in northwestern Bangladesh. Using a mix-method approach, this study examines the types and nature of challenges peasants face in two agrarian villages of Tanore Upazila of Rajshahi District. Peasants identified a total of 15 challenges in 5 domains related to their agricultural practices in the group discussions. In a follow-up questionnaire survey, 287 peasants described and prioritized their challenges in agricultural production and required management activities. Almost all the respondent peasants (97%) found higher input costs for seeds, fertilizers, pesticides, labor, and agricultural machinery as major challenges. Pest attacks, erratic rainfall, droughts, dense fog, and other hazards affect nearly 84% of respondents annually. The lack of labor supply and degradation of soil fertility are both cited as major challenges by almost 71% of the respondents. The market affects peasants negatively in many ways. An exploitative and middle-man-driven market arrangement prevented half of the respondents from generating adequate profit. According to 41% of the peasants, the volatile market is another major challenge. About 31% of respondents mentioned they lack investment funds. Overall, all these risks, coupled with prolonged subjugation in socioeconomic and political sectors, increase peasants' investment risk, first by reducing the expected output from agriculture, and second by limiting their investment capacity. A number of challenges have pushed peasants to work themselves to exhaustion and use excessive fertilizers and pesticides to increase yields. In the end, it threatens the natural environment, human health, and soil fertility. The research findings suggest that peasant farming should be taken under institutional frameworks at different levels (household, farm, market and state) to mitigate their challenges comprehensively.