Bangladesh J. Agric. Econ., XII, 2 ( December 1989 ) 75-87

Research note

RURAL MARKETS IN BANGLADESH AND THE RURAL MAINTENANCE PROGRAMME

M. Mosleh Uddin, M. Kabir, M. Mostafa Alam and G. K. Boss

ABSTRACT This study describes the Impact of rural maintenance programme on rural markets in Bangladesh. Rural Maintenance programme (RMP) is a year-round programme for maintenance ol 16 miles earthen roads In each selected union. The programme is run by crews consisting of 15 destitute women. The findings suggest that better road maintenance by RMP in the programme areas has resulted in more traffic f low through which the markets in the programme areas have been expanded. Better supply of services such as tea stalls and repair services for bicycle/rickshaw within the market were observed in programme area then in the control areas.

I . INTRODUCTI0N The Rural Maintenance Programme (RMP), introduced in rural Bangladesh in 1984, is a year-round programme for the maintenance of earthen roads. The Ministry of Relief and Rehabilitation (MORR) took up the programme which was implemented and is monitored by the CAR E. The programme is financed by the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) and CARE-CANADA through wheat grant aid monetized by the Government of Bangladesh (GOB). Union Parishads (UP) contribute 10 percent of the total wage bill paid to the maintenace workers. The maintenance work is done on 15 miles of earthen roads in each selected union. A crew of 15 destitute women are employed for this purpose. Each crew member receives a daily wage ( in cash ) of Tk. 16. The goal of RMP is to maintain a network of earthen market roads and provide permanent employment to destitute rural women. The CARE completed implementation *First two authors are Professors in the Departments of Statisties In Dhaka Univeisity and Jehangirnagar Univarsity respectively and the third author is a scientific Officer, Bangladesh Rice Research Institute, Joydebpur.

76 The Bangladesh Journal of Agricultural Economics of RMP by employing 60,105 rural destitute women in 4007 unions as of June, 1987. The CARE staff initially familiarized all concerned upazila officials and union chairmen with RMP at an inaugural session held in every upazila. The CARE team spent three days at each union. During each visit, CARE personnel assisted by union representatives, surveyed 15 miles of key union level roads, interviewed destitute women and selected fifteen of them as crew members. For each union, a bank account was opened at the nearest nationalized commercial bank in the names of the crew spokeswoman and her deputy. The salaries of the crew members are paid every fortnight from the bank. The crew members were trained on the rules of the programme and technical aspects of road maintenance. The union chairman and upazila technical staff, particularly the Project implementation Officer, oversee the work and provide technical assistance if required. After the maintenance work was started, the CARE technical staff paid monthly monitoring visits to each union to provide additional training to the women, check the quality of maintenance work, ensure regular payment of wages and make sure that other aspects of the programme were operating correctly. This maintenance programme was established in seven pilot unions in March, 1983. These pilot unions were continuously monitored. The socio-economic status of crew members and the attitude of the community toward the maintenance programme were evaluated. Although the nature and direction of the impacts of rural roads can be easily understood on the basis of a priori anan1ysis, it is really difficult to assess the exact magnitudes of these impacts. The impacts of a road are specific neither to an area nor to time. A road may directly or indirectly benefit the households living very close to the road as well as those who live relatively far away from it. Besides, impacts of roads are not confined only to the short run. Various impacts would be perceptible only In the long run. It is essential, however, to obtain reliable estimates of the impacts of rural roads to provide a basis for choosing between alternative road schemes and also between road and directly productive development schemes in order to maximize the returns from the available scarce resources. The objective of the present study is primarily to obtain the benchmark data, and secondly, to assess broad comparisons of the type and volume of

Rural Markets In Bangladesh : Mosleh Uddin et. al. 77 goods said services avaiable in the growth centres between programme and control aeas to capture the direction of change in the relevent economic indicators in the programme area. In addition, distance travelled by the beneficiaries and visit made by supervisory officials to different amenities as well as the frequency of shops alongside roads were also investigated in this study.

II. DATA SOURCES AND METHODOLOGY

A study was conducted in 1987 to evaluate the Impact of Rural Maintenance Programme in Rural Bangladesh. The details of the methodology is presented elsewhere ( Mosleh Uddln, et al. 1987 ). The information were collected during the months of April-May, 1987.

A total of 30 unions were selected for the study, Since the study puts greater emphasis on

the baseline survey, two-thirds of the unions ( i. e. 20 unions ) were selected from the control area while the remaining ten unions were selected from the programme area. In selecting these unions attention was given to exclude the types of unions listed below so the baseline survey could provide information on arses representative of typical unions where RMP Is in operation. For the sake of comparability between programme and nonprogramme areas the following criteria of exclusion was followed in the programme area :(i) unions where district/upazila headquarters are located have been excluded (ii) unions with relatively high levels industrialization have been excluded (III) unions where low-lying areas abound and the waterways constitute the main source of transport have been excluded (iv) unions with higher average cropping intensity and HYV cultivation have been excluded since these areas would be expected to have highlands with an already developed network of communication. Keeping in mind the objectives of the study a structured questionnaire subsequently pretested was employed to collect information. Besides, a check list was administered to obtain certain specific information.

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III. SUPPLIERS OF SELECTED COMMODITIES AND QUANTITIES SUPPLIED

The number of suppliers of a few important commodities as well as the quantities supplied were noted for each of the markets during the hat and non-hat days covered. The relevant hypothesis to be tested here is that the markets in the programme areas have been expanded; i. e., more commodities and more suppliers participate as a result of more traffic flow which has been achieved through better maintenance of roads in the programme areas by the initiatives of RMP.

In finding out the number of suppliers of a particular commodity, the transient

suppliers as well as the permanent shopke3pers were taken into account. Information on the amount of supply of a few important commodities (paddy. two kinds of vegetables considered important in the areas covered, dal, egg, poultry, fertilizer, textile and shoes), number of suppliers of these commodities and the distances from which the suppliers came were collected. Such information would be useful in understanding the impact of RMP on production as well as marketing. The relevant data presented in Table 1, show that for eight of the nine selected commodities, the absolute number of suppliers observed to be present per hat day within the programme areas was larger than that within the control area. The only commodity in which the absolute number of suppliers per hat day came out to be larger in the control area was paddy. However, adjusted data for population variations show larger number of suppliers in control area for two other commodities-eggs and fertilizer l. As for the non-hat days, absolute numbers of vegetables and eggs have been observed to be larger in the control area whereas absolute numbers of suppliers of all other commodities have been observed larger for the programme area. The comparison holds true when the relevant data are adjusted for population variation.

The quantities of the selected commodities marketed per hat day and non-hat day in

control and programme areas have been presented in Table 2. It will be noticed in this table that figures against some of the commodities (egg • 1 The ratio of control area Population to programme area Population was 0.8. Observed figures for programme

area was multiplied by 0.8 to arrive at the adjusted figures for population variation in subsequent tables where such adjustments were necessary.

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of the 20 markets had such services available. Banking services cannot, however, be expected to respond immediately to the expansion of the market of the dimension being discussed here. It should be noted that even if a market expands, the expansion, may not raise demand for this service to an extent which cannot be met by the existing banks. Besides, there would be a reaso-nable lag between perceived excess demand for banking services in the area and establishment of new banking institutions there. These institutions can be established only after favourable public policies are formulated in this regard and adequate funds are made available. Beside, information on the number of depositors and the volume of deposits in the existing bank branches were not collected. Thus, very little can be said about the impact of RMP on the banking system. It is, however, expected that with the improvement in the communication the expansion of markets would generate demand for opening of banks in the programme area. Distances Travelled and Visits made

Information was gathered on the distances travelled by the beneficiaries visiting places like

family welfare centres, agricultural extension departments and development oriented non-government organizations. Visits made to these institutions by officials from upazila head quarters were also obtained. The intention was to test the hypothesis that beneficiaries from more distant places visit these institutions in the programme area and officials from upazila head quarters pay more frequent visits due to improved road conditions resulting from the work of RMP.

In collecting necessary information on distance covered by beneficiaries and number of visits from upaziia head quarters, each day for six working days of a week, in every union, at least one institution was surveyed. In some unions, more than one institution was surveyed. Looking at the data in Table 7 on average distances covered by a beneficiary in reaching these institutions in control and programme areas, the distance is found to be little in the programme area. A study of the data on average number of visits made per week to the local offices by officials from upazila head quarters shows that there is no difference between the control and programme areas in this regard. This shows that even if RMP had improved the conditions of roads in the programme area, the upazila officials will not be influenced by it to keep in close contact with local officials.

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ted baseline data for 20 such non-programme unions on such factors allows of traffic, transport charges, travel time, market supply, services within market and distances covered by the beneficiaries in reaching various amenities. Besides, the study looked into these factors within 10 unions under RMP. Although the non-programme unions studied here cannot serve as the "Ideal control" for evaluating the impact of RMP, an attempt has been made to compare and contrast situations in programme and non-programme areas, considering the latter to be in the control in the hope of at least generating some tentative ideas on the subject.

In comparing volumes of the markets, either in terms of number of suppliers of quantities marketed, a some-what larger volume has been perceptible 1n the programme area on hat days even after adjusting the figures for population variations. This provides some degree of acceptability to the hypothesis that markets in the programme areas were somewhat expanded through the operations of RMP. Similar findings were reported by Kamaluddin, et al, 1986; Chowdhury & Hossain, 1984. Looking at the services available within the market, it seems that food services provided by tea stalls and repair services for bicycles rickshaws have proliferated in the programme area. This could have been a consequence of the market expansion resulting from better road maintenance by RMP. However, the difference is significant that can be attributed to RMP. Beneficiaries of different amenities in the programme area were not found to cover a larger distance than beneficiaries in the control area. The number of visits made by officials from upazifa head quarters to the union level offices is also same when control and programme areas are compared. Conditions of roads as well as nature and volume of marketing are greatly affected by seasonal variations so that to obtain a complete picture of the situation one has to carry out the investigation round the year and present an inter temporal analysis. Since the RMP has been in operation for only two years in the study area it is too early to draw any firm conclusion. A comprehensive study, taking into account the demand side along with the supply side and incorporating a broad range of secio-econcmic variables, should be conducted to answer many questions that have not been resolved in this paper.