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Information Needs of Rural Women: A Study of Three Villages of Bangladesh

2012; University of Idaho Library; Linguagem: Inglês

1522-0222

Md Arman Hossain, Md. Shariful Islam,

Library Science and Administration

Introduction The information society is where everyone can create, access, utilize and share information and knowledge, enabling individuals, communities and peoples to achieve their full potential in promoting their sustainable development and improving their quality of life (Olorunda, 2004). The main objective of information society is to empower all the people through access to and use of information, but there is concern that some people, including women, are more distant than others from the opportunities presented by the changes being created by ICTs. Women's education and empowerment have been important social, economic, and political issues in the developing countries like Bangladesh and over the past three decades Bangladesh has made impressive gains in these areas. Women of Bangladesh are now participating in family decision making as well as in national and international socioeconomic and political development. Women, irrespective of location, need information on family health, food and nutrition, family planning and child education, but rural women also need information regarding agriculture and animal husbandry for their involvement in socio-economic growth. However, the women who live in villages have lack of access to information resources and inability to have access to Information and Communication Technology. The rural women are remained as unexploited national resources and the whole nation would be benefited if they are properly involved in the development activities in a planned way (Agriculture Information Service [AIS], 2004). Library or information centers can mitigate information needs of rural women through access to relevant information and can enable rural women of Bangladesh participating in the national economic development. Background Bangladesh is bordered by India on the east, west and north and by the Bay of Bengal on the south. There is also a small strip of frontier with Myanmar on the south-eastern edge. Bangladesh has an area of 147,570 sq. km. with an estimated population of 158,570,535 (July 2011) (The World Factbook, 2011). More than 75% of the population live in rural areas (Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics, 2009a). This study was carried out in three villages of Ghoraghat thana of Dinajpur district in Bangladesh. The villages are Ahiura, Balahar and Kashigari. These villages were selected mostly because of the similarity in their socio-economic and demographic characteristics. A brief description of the demographic information of these villages provides the background and context of the study. Dinajpur District Dinajpur is a large district at the northern part of Bangladesh having many historical places and famous for the production of rice and litchi. The district of 3437.98 square kilometers area is comprises of 13 upazilas (sub-disrict) which have 2143 villages. At the time of this survey, the total population of the district was 2642850, of which 2271986 lived in villages and about half of those people were female. Only 46% people (40% women) of this district were literate. About 80% of the people depended on agriculture, 7% people were businessman and only 2% people were engaged with service, and the rest of the people were involved with other professions (Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics, 2001). Ghoraghat Upazila Ghoraghat is a small upazila (148.67 Sq. Km.) of Dinajpur district which included 4 unions and 112 villages. The total number of households in the upazila at the time of this survey was 24489, of which 23407 were in rural areas. When the data were collected for this study, the total population of this upazila was 103119, of which 98565 people lived in villages and only 4554 people lived in urban areas. The main source of income of the inhabitants of this upazila was agriculture, only a very few people were involved with business or service (Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics, 2001). Ahiura Ahiura is a very small village of 280 acres area. …