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The Bangladesh Development Studies Volume X, March 1982, Number 1 The Farm Wage and Land Market Situation under Comilla Cooperative Programme By Jasim U. Ahmed Under the present social set-

Jasim U. Ahmed

 

Abstract

Under the present social set-up in Bangladesh, the role of the Comilla cooperative programme in augmenting farm supply and thus bringing about prosperity to owner farmers has largely dominated over its role in promoting equity. This is reflected in the low participation of poor farmers in the programme as well as in falling real wage to farm workers and fast rising income and wealth gains to land owners due to increase in productivity, rent and price of farm land. Thus, the scope of the Comilla cooperative programme is reduced to that of other Government programmes for modernizing agriculture by strengthening the input supply system through larger private sector participation. Available data do not indicate that the process of concentration of land ownership and polarization among peasantry through land transfer is a specific phenomenon for the areas with Comilla-type cooperative programme. It is rather a concomitant feature of pauperization in Bangladesh peasantry as a whole. Appropriate Government action may be taken to correct the undemocratic functional mechanism of the Comilla cooperative programme to ensure the full-fledged participation of the poor farmers. This may be also supplemented by policies towards agricultural wage and rent reforms in order to ensure a steady growth in the income of farm workers and poor tenants in accordance with changing production possibilities.

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