Rural women and food security in Mymensingh district

The study was undertaken to determine the key factors relevant to rural women enhancing food security which have great contribution to food security in their family and community. A sample size of 80 women was drawn from Char Ishawrdia village of Mymensingh sadar upazila. This finding showed that most of the respondents constituted economically active but were not well educated. It was found that the yearly average income and expenditure of the households were Tk.66656.25 and Tk.67238.75 respectively. It was also found that yearly average income of the respondents was only Tk.7600.00. Rural women of the study area were involved in harvesting crops, crop production, livestock rearing, homestead forestry and gardening, post-harvest operation, cooking, cleaning house, washing cloth and caring children. There were some factors relevant to rural women affecting food security. In functional analysis, the Log Linear model was fitted best. In this model, the household food security was significantly influenced by education of respondent, family size, household income, access to credit, and social participation. From the study it was found that women were highly empowered in study area and empowered women had great contribution to ensure the household food security. By the process of empowering women, now respondents have a chance to increase their income, to participate in decision making process, to build up their health and nutritional knowledge, control over capital and participate in social and political activities through which they can easily ensure food security. Findings of the study suggest that government should provide different types of facilities to rural women which will help those women to ensure household food security. Government should also take attempts to change the social attitudes towards the rural women