Socio-economic Characteristics and Its Impact on Onion Cultivation in Jaffna District of Sri Lanka

Abstract

The aim of this study is to investigate the impact of socio-economic characteristics on production of onion in Jaffna district and for this purpose, 04 major regions where mostly the farmers cultivation the onion in the district. A set of questionnaires was used to conduct the study and 25 onion farmers were selected randomly from each region and finally total of 100 onion farmers were taken as a sample in the study. The collected data was analyzed using frequency analysis and independent sample t-test, correlation and multiple regression analysis also applied to identify the impact of socio-economic characters on onion farmers in the study. In the sample 79% of the farmers are male while 21% of them are female and 77% of the onion cultivators used rental land and 23% of them used own land. According to descriptive statistics, it implied that average age of the farmers was 56 years with 23 years of average farming experience. Results of independent sample t-test revealed that, average production of onion differ across gender, types of fertilizer usage and ownership of land whereas correlation of coefficient suggested that onion production has 50% and 56% of positive correlation with age and farming experience respectively. Multiple regression results proved that out of five characters, only sex of the farmers and farming experience were significantly affecting the production of onion in the study area. Findings of the study may help the agricultural officers and the onion farmers to make the policy implications and strategies to enhance the production of onion in future.