Socio-Economic Profile of Mithun Farmers of Nagaland

Abstract

Socioeconomic status is a measurement of economic and social position of an individual in the society. It influences the accessibility to the resources, livelihood pattern, food and nutritional security. The investigation was conducted to review the situation of mithun rearing in Nagaland with the objectives to study the socioeconomic status of mithun farmers and its relationship to the number of mithun reared. Data for the present study was collected from a sample of 100 mithun farmers at four mithun rearing villages of two districts of Nagaland. A multistage random sampling technique was followed for the selection of mithun farmers. Significant percentage of the mithun farmers had medium level of socioeconomic status. Most of them belong to the age group up to 50 years; the agriculture along with animal rearing was their main occupation and education level of the mithun farmers was up to high school. Most of the mithun farmers were found to have low level of social participation, two third families of mithun farmers were nuclear type, had medium to small family and farm size. The houses of mithun farmers were made up of wood to wood and cement (mixed type) construction had medium to low materials possession and also had medium to low education status of family. The mithun farmers had medium annual income from mithun husbandry. It was also observed that the mithun farmers rearing more mithun had more annual income from mithun husbandry and had more total annual income. Relationship between socioeconomic status and number of mithun reared was significant and positively correlated. It was concluded that the mithun farmers were having more number of mithun have high socioeconomic status and vice-versa in mithun rearing area of Nagaland.