Opportunities and determinants for rural youth engagement in catfish farming: empirical evidence from north-central Bangladesh

Providing productive and dignified work for rural youth is one of the most serious concerns of the twenty-first century in countries characterised by a growing population, such as Bangladesh. Expanding employment in the aquaculture sector is important in this context, as it is labour intensive and requires limited land resources, which is essential in densely populated areas. Yet, despite the high potential of catfish farming as a source of income for rural youth in north-central Bangladesh, its adoption appears to be slow. The purpose of this work was to investigate how rural youth perceive their socioeconomic circumstances to be an opportunity to engage in catfish farming and what factors influence their engagement. The study was conducted in the Mymensingh district. The Department of Youth Development Office’s database contained the names and addresses of 1003 rural youth, 10% of whom were chosen at random for this study. A structured questionnaire was used to collect data from 100 of these rural youth in face-to-face interviews. Descriptive statistics were performed to explore the respondents’ impressions of their living circumstances, and binary logistic regression was used to identify the factors determining their engagement in catfish farming. Although our sample was unemployed and considered their socioeconomic conditions to be favourable for starting a catfish-farming business, catfish farming was not currently a substantial source of income for them. Our findings further showcase that engagement in catfish farming by rural youth is not just based on their perceptions about opportunities available in their social context. It is further determined by extrinsic and intrinsic factors, such as family size, annual family income, level of knowledge, attitude toward catfish farming, catfish cultivation skills, and organisation involvement. In this study, we examined how rural youth assessed the available opportunities surrounding their social setting and the determinants of the decision to adopt catfish farming in a fish-farming-based region of Mymensingh, Bangladesh. Our findings contribute to the gap in understanding concerning the low level of engagement of rural youth in catfish farming. Therefore, policymakers should use these findings to promote catfish farming among rural youth.