Factors affecting mobile phone usage by the farmers in receiving information on vegetable cultivation in Bangladesh

Mobile phone can reduce the transaction cost resulted in increasing the farm productivity. This paper mainly focuses on identifying the factors affecting the use of mobile phone by the farmers and determining the extent of use of mobile phone by the farmers in receiving information on vegetable cultivation. The study was carried out at three villages under Mymensingh sub- district of Mymensingh district in Bangladesh. Seventy farmers were interviewed using structured questionnaire during April 1 to May 1 2016. Appropriate scales were used in order to measure the concerned variables. Both descriptive and inferential statistics were used to analyze the collected data. The majority (70 %) of the vegetable farmers were low user of mobile phone compared to 30 percent were medium user. None of them was found under high mobile phone user. Vegetable farmers’ characteristics such as education and social participation had significant positive relationships with their use of mobile phone while age and farming experience had significant relationships with negative trend. Among them age alone explained 33.1 per cent of the variations to mobile phone usage was confirmed by the step-wise multiple regression model. However, age and social participation were the influential factors affecting the use of mobile phone by the farmers. Lack of mobile servicing centre, expensiveness and electricity problem were the major constraints that cause hindrance to the use of mobile phone in receiving information on vegetables cultivation. Government should take initiatives to ensure proper electricity supply in village area and provide subsidy to easily purchase of mobile phone by the farmers. Besides, field extension agents should encourage and assist the farmers to use mobile phone in receiving information on vegetable cultivation.