ASSESSMENT OF LIVELIHOOD SECURITY OF FARMERS IN COASTAL AREA OF SOUTH GUJARAT

Abstract

Gujarat has the longest coastline about 1600 km.The shore line have been approached to the habitable area, local people of coastal villages are belonging to farming community. These communities are totally depended upon the farming and fishing business. Since no systematic effort has up till been made to study the livelihood security of the coastal area farmers, it was thought worthwhile to make an in-depth study on livelihood security of coastal area farmers which would throw light on the developmental aspects of the coastal area famers. Navsari and Valsad districts of South Gujarat were purposively selected for present investigation because both districts are having Coastal belt and suffering from high salinity ingress in their land and farmers having troubling of their livelihood. Total 120 respondents were selected by employing multi-stage purposively random sampling technique. The data were collected through personal interview schedule of the respondents. The collected data were analyzed by using scale developed by Mamathalakshmi (2013). The Results of the present study shown that majority of the coastal area farmers had medium level of overall livelihood security.