USE OF COMMUNICATION SOURCES BY THE WOMEN BENEFICIARIES OF RDRS IN INCOME GENERATING ACTIVITIES

Abstract

The main purpose of this study was to categories and describes the profile characteristics of the women beneficiaries, to determine the use of communication sources by the women beneficiaries, and to explore the relationship between the profile characteristics of the women beneficiaries of RDRS with their use of communication sources. Data were collected using interview schedule from a sample of 112 women beneficiaries selected by multistage random sampling procedure from five villages of Rajendrapur union under sadar upazila of Rangpur district during 15 February to 16 March 2012. Use of communication sources by the RDRS women beneficiaries was determined initially on three dimensions viz. attitude, contact and application, and finally the use of communication sources index (UCSI) was computed. The UCSI ranged from 45.24 to 277.68 with a possible range of 0 to 300. Based on UCSI, among the 10 communication sources the first five communication sources were husband (277.68), neighbours (219.05), RDRS- worker (205.95), RDRS group meeting (193.45) and relatives (160.42). The findings revealed that the highest proportion (38.39 percent) of the women beneficiaries had medium use of communication sources compared to 33.93 percent low use and 27.68 percent high use. However, the last five communication sources were RDRS officer (134.82), mobile phone (112.80), television (68.75), inputs dealer (63.99) and SAAOs (45.24). Among the 10 characteristics of the women beneficiaries education, farm size, annual income, daily time use, credit received and participation in IGAs showed positive relationship with their use of communication sources; fatalism of the women beneficiaries showed negative correlation while their age, family size and dependency had no relationship.