Unemployment and Underemployment in Agriculture

Bangladesh combines extreme poverty with the highest density of population in the world. No human society has ever been faced with such a dismal poverty on such a massive scale as in Bangladesh. Agriculture is the most dominant sector of her economy, but it is also the poorest. The author’s hypothesis is that the root cause of poverty in Bangladesh is due to massive unemployment and underemployment. The author, therefore, studies intensively the extent, the nature and the characteristic pattern of agricultural unemployment an underemployment in Bangladesh in order to evolve a sound policy measures that would help in uplifting the teeming millions in Bangladesh. The author’s study is organized into seven chapters. First, he analyses the nature of unemployment in different regions of Bangaldesh. Next he takes up the productive aspect of employment which leads him to an intensive analysis of unemployment and underemployment in agriculture at microlevel. The author gains a greater clarity of the problem by studying the functioning of 127 farms. The study unfolds the debate on the relationship between farm size and productivity as also the inverse relationship between the size of farm and productivity. Two more related topics, namely, the effect of the institution on share cropping on output and labour utilization and principal determinants of labour use have been studies next. In the final chapter the author outlines a general policy framework, where an attempt has been made to evolve a strategy of employment promotion with growth and equity for Bangladesh. The book, based on extensive empirical research, demonstrates, for the first time, the depth and dimensions of mass poverty in Bangladesh.