Abstract:
Fisheries sector occupies a very important place in the socio-economic development of the country, as it contribute to economic growth and human welfare. Fisheries sector has been recognized as the powerful income and employment generator for the poor people of rural area. Six purposively selected blocks namely Jagdalpur, Bastar, Lohandiguda, Tokapal, Bakawand and Darbha located in Bastar district were selected for the purpose of the study. The sample size was comprised of numbers 10, 21 and 43 members from the fishery cooperative societies, SHGs and fishermen groups respectively, with overall respondents being 74. The various characteristics of respondents were studied considering age, education, sex, group size, occupation, annual income, size of water body/pond and credit acquisition as independent variable as well as to find out the economics, constraints and suggestions of fish production. Socio-economic characteristics of the respondents indicated that the majority of them belonged to middle age (35-55 years), had middle school education for fishery cooperative societies as well as SHGs and up to primary school education for fishermen groups, SHGs were having about 71.43 % of females as compared to only 28.58 % of males, however in fishery cooperative societies and fishermen groups their percentage was very less, more number of members were found in fishery cooperative societies as compared to SHGs and fishermen groups, it was expected because cooperative societies work on a large scale, majority of respondents had benefited multifold by doing agriculture, animal husbandry as well as fisheries at a time. Per hectare production cost was almost similar in fishery cooperative societies and SHGs (Rs. 38883.31 & Rs. 39152.67 respectively) however it was much more in case of fishermen groups (Rs.56125.48) indicating the better economics of the earlier. Productivity of fish was found 32.50 quintals, 42.22 quintals and 38.16 quintals of fish for fishery cooperative societies, SHGs and fishermen groups, respectively.