EFFECT OF CRAB FARMING ON THE LIVELIHOOD AS PERCEIVED BY COASTAL FARMERS

Abstract

Bangladesh has an excellent opportunity to earn a lot of foreign currency from the foreign market from crab export by utilizing the coastal belt. The agro-climatic conditions along the coast of Bangladesh can produce more crab farming than shrimp farming. As a result, more than 5,000 families living along the coastal rivers of Bangladesh have taken up crab farming. Considering above opportunities, this study was designed to investigate the effect of crab farming on the livelihood as perceived by coastal farmers. For this study, data were collected from 113 farmers of Rampal, Mongla, Sarankhola, and Morrelgonj upazilas of Bagerhat district during the period of February 10 to March 08, 2020. Descriptive statistics, stepwise multiple regression and constraints faced index (CFI) were used to analyze the data. Most of the coastal farmers (64.60 percent) achieved moderate livelihood improvement through crab farming, while 15.05 percent had a high effect of crab farming on the livelihood. Among the variables, annual income from crab farming alone contributed 37.8 percent of the variation while availability of marketing information, crab farm size, the experience of crab farming, and knowledge on crab farming contributed 5.7%, 2.6%, 2.7% and 1.9%, respectively to the effect of crab farming on the livelihood as perceived by coastal farmers. The majority (69.91 percent) of crab farmers faced moderate constraints on crab farming, while 7.97 percent faced high constraints. According to the Constraints Faced Index (CFI), natural disasters like flood, erosion etc. ranked first followed by presence of virus and other diseases, domination by middleman in case of price determination, non-availability of quality mud crab seed for commercial farming in farms, and grading system pricing of crab. It was concluded that the composite effect of crab farming on the livelihood of the farmers was moderate and needed further advancement. Based on the results, it was recommended that the concerned authorities should implement and popularize large-scale farmer-based projects for crab farming to improve the livelihood of the coastal farmers.