An Adrift Community in Mainstream Bangladesh: Case of Tea Workers

Asian Journal of Agricultural Extension, Economics & Sociology 39(1): 43-56, 2021; Article no.AJAEES.65075 ISSN: 2320-7027 An Adrift Community in Mainstream Bangladesh: Case of Tea Workers Kanij Fatema1*, Dipta Sarker1,2, Jasim Uddin Ahmed1, Kausar Ahmed Majumder1 and Md. Faizul Kabir3 1 Department of Agricultural Economics and Policy, Sylhet Agricultural University, Bangladesh. 2 Bangladesh Krishi Bank, Bangladesh. 3 Bangladesh Bank (Central Bank of Bangladesh), Bangladesh. Authors’ contributions This work was carried out in collaboration among all authors. Authors KF and DS designed the study, performed the statistical analyses, wrote the protocol and wrote the first draft of the manuscript. Author JUA review the manuscript. Author KAM managed the review of literature and analysis of the study. Author MFK designed the methodology, statistical analyses and review the manuscripts. All authors read and approved the final manuscript. Article Information DOI: 10.9734/AJAEES/2021/v39i130500 Editor(s): (1) Dr. Shakeel-Ul-Rehman, Islamic University of Science and Technology, India. Reviewers: (1) Barlin Orlando Olivares Campos, University of Cordoba, Spain. (2) Jesús G. Rodríguez Diego, Universidad Autonoma Metropolitana, (UAM). Mexico. Complete Peer review History: http://www.sdiarticle4.com/review-history/65075 Original Research Article Received 20 November 2020 Accepted 27 January 2021 Published 10 February 2021 ABSTRACT This research was conducted to analyze the status of tea workers of selected areas of Bangladesh. Primary data were collected through direct interview and secondary data were also collected from different sources. A total of 100 tea workers were randomly selected from Ootterbhag and Indanugger tea estate of Moulvibazar. Descriptive statistics and functional analyses were employed to achieve the objectives of the research. Risk facing index, food security index, food consumption score were calculated and binary logistic regression were carried out to identify the factors affecting food security status. The study revealed that the life of tea workers in selected areas are vulnerable. Wages are not adequate to meet basic needs and the wage raises are not keeping pace with the cost of living. Considering 4.51 average family member the respondent family household is far below the international poverty line (1.90 US$). It was observed from the analysis that 52% sample respondents were illiterate. However, the maximum respondents also agreed that they faced various ____________________________________________________________________________________________________ *Corresponding author: E-mail: kanij.aep@sau.ac.bd, f7kanij@yahoo.com; Fatema et al.; AJAEES, 39(1): 43-56, 2021; Article no.AJAEES.65075 psychological, mechanical and biological hazards. Household calorie availability or consumption behavior was revealed by food consumption score, which exemplified that 49% respondents are in borderline food consumption pattern while 5% and 46% are in poor and acceptable level respectively. The overall average daily per capita calorie intake by tea workers was observed to be 2076.3996 kilo calorie, which is lower than the national average of Bangladesh. Only 35% household were food secure based on calorie intake. Household was food insecure if number of dependent persons in family increases; food secure with increase in household monthly income; and household food security decreases with increase in household size. Keywords: Tea workers; vulnerability; risk facing index; food consumption score; food security; Bangladesh. 1. INTRODUCTION limiting them from getting quality health care [13]. “Food security exists when all people, at all times, have physical and economic access to sufficient safe and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preferences for an active and healthy life” [14]. Household food security encompasses four elements i.e., food availability, accessibility, utilization, and stability [14]. Food security indicator is highly sensitive to rice price changes [15]. A study on food security index of the tea gardens in West Bengal, India, marked that unrealistic and irregular wage pattern, inhuman living conditions and frequent closure of the gardens are the focal concerns [16]. In Bangladesh, “proportion of population living below the national upper poverty line has consistently declined reaching 31.5 % in 2010, 24.3 % in 2016, and 20.5 %in 2019”, households having access to improved sanitation was 56% in 2012 has increased around 84% in 2019, access to safe drinking water and electricity are respectively 98.5 % and 92.23 % in 2019 [17]. Per capita daily calorie intake at the national level was 2,238.5 kcal in 2005 which has increased to 2,318.3 kcal in 2010 [18]. Bangladesh has made praiseworthy progress in all aspects of millennium development goals between 1992 to 2015 but there are disparities among tea garden workers [2]. Tea, a popular drink plays significant role in the economy of Bangladesh. Meeting the domestic demand of 86,635 thousand kg, Bangladesh exported 16.65 million kilograms of tea in 201920 in different countries which worth 36.62 million USD [1]. At present there are 167 tea estates located in seven districts of Bangladesh. The annual expected tea production in 2020 is set at 75.94 million kilograms, whereas 79.33 millions of kilograms have been produced so far till November 2020 which exceed the target by about 4 million kilograms [1]. There are about 100,000 tea workers of which 80,000 are permanent workers and 20,000 are casual workers [2], working in different tea estates. Irrespective of large number of laborer, they are getting very low salary Taka 102 (US$ 1.2 per day), recently, tea workers protested about wage rise up to Taka 300 (US$ 3.52) but the agreement settled by rising only US$ 0.2 per day, now the salary is Taka 120 ( US$ 1.42) per day [3]. Most of the tea garden workers lives below poverty line [4], have poor income [5,6], deprived of basic needs [7], which causes problems of poverty [8]. Probable reasons behind this are low income [2], workers are unable to consume nutritious food, socio-economic status, nutritional status and sanitation coverage is poor among the female tea garden workers [9], and poor families had lower dietary diversity than non-poor households in Bangladesh [10]. Since workers are not satisfied with wages including fringe benefit, they are not attentive in increasing productivity which hampers the country’s economic growth [11]. Food insufficiency was profoundly predominant, half of children in tea gardens had low dietary diversity [12], risk associated with pregnant women and new born babies, unhygienic and destructive postnatal practices were utilized, misguided judgments and unsafe conventional practices were found to exist among the families in the tea gardens that The above mentioned discussion and review indicated that tea workers are discriminated in many ways in terms of wages and other facilities. There are few studies about socio-economic aspects and livelihood status of tea workers but particular studies about vulnerability, the risk faced by the tea workers and food security status in Bangladesh are rare. Keeping these factors in mind this research answer the following- i) How extent the workers are vulnerable? ii) Are the workers facing any kind of risks? What are the existing risks that the tea workers initially face; iii) Are they food secured?; and iv) What are the factors affecting food security? To find the answer the objectives of this research was to i) 44 Fatema et al.; AJAEES, 39(1): 43-56, 2021; Article no.AJAEES.65075 And RFI= 2× A+ 1×D, where A and D denote agree and disagree with the problem statement respectively. analyze the vulnerability of the tea workers in terms of socio-demographic profiles; ii) explore the risk faced by the workers, iii) analyze the food consumption pattern and food security status of the tea workers; and iv) find out the factors influencing food security status of the respondents. 2.2.2 Determination security of household food Access to food was measured on the basis of ability to have meals per day. The respondents were directly asked to mention whether they were able to have three meals/day, two meals/day and one meal/day over a period as per described by Talukder [20]. Scores assigned were 1, 2 and 3 for taking 1 meal, 2 and 3 meals per day respectively. 2. MATERIALS AND METHODS 2.1 Study Area and Sampling Procedure Moulvibazar, a northeastern district of Bangladesh was the study area. The survey schedule was developed to collect the expected primary data from tea workers of Ootterbhag and Indanugger tea estate of Rajnagar upazila. Additionally, various secondary data was supplemented from different sources. A random sampling method was used for selecting the samples. In total 100 respondents were chosen randomly among 720 workers. Data was collected through questionnaire by personal interview method. The data and information were collected from the sample tea workers from November/2018 to December/2018. 2.2.3 Food consumption respondent score of the There are two standard threshold levels for food consumption score (FCS) that has been pointed out by WFP [21,22,23]. WFP (2008) defined the FCS as follows: "FCS is a score calculated using the frequency of consumption of different food groups consumed by a household during the seven days.” The interviewee is asked to respond to the frequency of consumption (in days) for different food groups over a period of time. Different weight has been given to different groups based on nutrient content presented in table 1. To get an individual score for the food group weighted were assigned and have been multiplied by the frequency [21,22,23]. The summation of all food score values provides the final FCS. Similar with Kabir [23,24], the following equation shows the calculation procedure of FCS- 2.2 Data Analysis and Techniques To achieve the objectives, a combination of descriptive and statistical techniques as demanded by the study was used. Various descriptive statistical measures (i.e. sum, average, percentages, and ratios.) were calculated. Risk facing index, food consumption score, food security index and binary logistic regression analysis were done to fulfill the objectives of this research. STATA 2014 software was used for the analysis. = 2.2.1 Risk facing index + + + + + & ℎ + + + & ℎ Risk Facing Index (RFI) = 3×H+ 2× F+ 1×L+ 0×S It distinguishes the food consumption level. The need of a second limit level emerges due to regular consumption pattern of oil and sugar in some region. Therefore, this threshold level is used for a region or area where oil and sugar consumption are frequent presented in table 2. Oil and sugar simultaneously compose the base of 7 for FCS as their weight is 0.5. Therefore, the standard threshold just raised by 7 points for each three group of consumption level [24,25]. Here, H, M, L and S means total number respondents mentioning high, fair, little dissatisfaction and satisfaction as a risk of a particular statement respectively. Household calorie availability was estimated using food nutrient composition adopted from WFP 1988, retrieved from [24,25] which is presented in Table 3. Risk were measured in terms of hazards and based on the perception of the workers. Similar with Borgohain [19], present research considered psychological, mechanical and biological hazard encountered by the workers. In this research, risk facing index were calculated and rank have been assigned to find out the highest categories of problems faced by the respondents. 45 Fatema et al.; AJAEES, 39(1): 43-56, 2021; Article no.AJAEES.65075 3.1.1 Dependents in the househod Daily per capita calorie consumption was estimated by dividing the estimated daily calorie supply to the household by the household size [26]. Food security index (Z) was constructed and food security status of each household was determined based on the food security line using the recommended daily calorie intake approach. A household with 2122 kcal per capita consumption [27], was regarded as food secure and the family who were below regarded as food insecure households. The mathematical representations are as follows: Food Security Index, = / The family size and its composition are related to both income pattern and occupation. In this present study a family has been defined as a group of persons living together and taking their meals from the same kitchen. The average family size of the study area was 4.51 appeared to be slightly higher than the national average 4.06 [27]. Among the respondents, 90% of the respondents have two or more earning members in the family. Only 10% of the workers are the only earning member of the family. Only 7% of the respondents have mentioned that one of their family members is working outside the tea garden. th Where, Zi= Food security status of i households which take values of 1 for food secure households or 0 for food insecure households; Yi th = Daily per capita calorie intake of i household; and R = Recommended per capita daily calorie intake. Based on the household food security index (Z), the Logit model was estimated to identify the factors affecting food security status. 3.1.2 Education It was observed from the analysis that 52% sample respondents were illiterate and 48% literate, in which 33% had sign only, 14% primary level, 1% secondary level, no one has higher secondary level and Graduation and postgraduation degree. The dependent variable is assumed as dummy in nature. 1 = Food secured and 0= Not secured. The list of independent variables with their category and codes which are used in this analysis presented in table 4. A typical logistic regression model used took the following form: Logit (Pi) = ln (Pi / 1 – Pi) = α + β1X1+…..+ βnXn + Ut 3.1.3 Wage structure It is found that most of the tea garden workers inherited their occupation from their parents. Almost all of the family member’s profession was found as daily laborer working in the garden. The respondents are categorized into two groups (permanent or not) to find out the respondent job status. The data revealed that 96% of the respondents are permanent and rest 4% of the respondent are casual workers. As the wages of the workers are fixed on the basis of the memorandum of agreement signed between employers represented by Bangladesh Tea Association (BTA) and the tea plantation workers represented by Bangladeshio Cha Sramik Union (BCSU) it may vary depending on registered and not-registered workers. According to the latest agreement on 2020 the permanent workers are getting Taka 120 per day but for this research the data were collected from the laborers in 2018 when the wages was Taka 102.00 per day. The wage structure of the laborer was on weekly basis. It is found that the daily wage of the workers is same (Tk. 102.00) irrespective of permanent, casual, male, female and adolescent workers. The average monthly salary of worker is Tk. 2652. The ration commodities procured from the government at subsidized prices (BDT 2 per kg) and the prices of both rice and wheat were the same for the workers. Each worker is Pi represents the probability of a household to be food secures and (1 –Pi) represents the probability of a household to be food insecure. 3. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 3.1 Vulnerability Workers of the Tea Garden There are more than 12 castes among the tea workers including Bengali workers (10%). Generally, in Bangladesh, the male members are dominating than female members in the household as they are the main income earning persons [8], but in this study area the scenario is far different (71.0%) were female headed while 29 households (29.0%) were male headed. Among all household members, most of the respondents (92.00%) belonged to 15-54 age groups which are economically active group. Only 8 respondents (8.00%) belonged to 55 or above age category while none was under 15 ages. The average age of the household head was found to be about 31 years. 46 Fatema et al.; AJAEES, 39(1): 43-56, 2021; Article no.AJAEES.65075 provided a simple ration card giving his/her personal details. If both husband and wife of a family are workers, a maximum of three dependents are entitled to get ration of that family. If a family has 2 or more permanent worker in the family, each of them will get the allocated ration. Weekly ration for 1 to 8 years old dependents are 1.5 kg., 9 to 12 years old dependents are 2.50 kg. and who are more than 12 years old are not entitled to get ration. A worker gets 3.5 kg. of rice or wheat per week (0.5 kg per day). The average rations that the respondents have got per week were about 4.6 kg. It is obligatory for the tea garden authority to employ at least one of the families (son/daughter) of a worker in the particular garden by agreement. toilets (without water seals) connected to open pits. The construction is mostly made of tin walls and roof. It was found that open defecation is a frequent phenomenon among the tea garden workers. This practice has serious adverse effect on their health and environment as well. This demonstrates the lack of awareness of the workers about hygiene and healthy life. Among the respondents 17% set up toilets at their own cost, 38% have got assistance from the authority and 45% mentioned that they did not get any assistance from the authority to set up toilet. 3.1.6 Access to drinking water, gas and electricity Almost all of the respondents have mentioned that they have access to tube-well for drinking water. All of the labor lines have more than two tube-wells with 4 to 5 families sharing a tubewell. These tube-wells are provided by the authority. But the workers expressed dissatisfaction over sharing the tube-well with more than two families. The garden has electricity access inside it. Most of the houses have electricity access. Every household has to pay for the electricity use that has connection. 10% of households in the labor lines of the garden have no electricity connection and 90% of the houses have electricity connection provided by the government agencies. Some of them mention that they are not taking the electricity connection due to poverty. Though, the garden has gas connection, only the factory and managerial staff use gas in their houses. Thus, they mention that they cannot afford the cost of getting energy. 3.1.4 Income and expenditure Annual household income of the tea workers was Tk. 49645 (586 US$) which is equivalent income of Tk 137 (1.62 US$) per day for a family. Considering 4.51 average family members the respondent family household is far below the international poverty line (1.90 US$). Household annual expenditure was Tk. 47496 (560 US$) of which about 62% of total expenditure were spend on consumption of food items, 22% for education, 12% for clothing, 10% for medicine and rest 4% for others such as communication, transportation, housing, festivals, feed for cattle and livestock. 3.1.5 Type of house, Sanitation and toilet facilities There are quarters for the permanent workers and they get the repairing facilities from the authority too. Three types of housing structure have seen where 18, 74 and 8% of the workers lived in i.e., Pucca (building), Kutcha (house made with mud wall and tin), and houses made with bamboo and grass respectively. 68% of the respondents have mentioned that the accommodation provided by the authority is sufficient for their family while, 32% have stated that the house is not sufficient for living. It is not healthy to stay in such small houses where they had to share the rooms with several members of the household. It is a matter of concern that the sanitation facilities is very poor in research area. 21% of the respondents have mentioned that they do not have any toilet at all. About 79% respondents have toilet at their home of whom 31% have sanitary toilets and the rest of them use traditional toilet. These toilets are direct pit 3.1.7 Membership of organizations, access to credit and saving The organization includes different co-operative societies, NGOs, social institutions which help the tribal people to share their common economic social and cultural problems. A large number of respondents were member of any organization which is 88% of total respondents while 12% were not member of any organization. In the tea worker communities, most of the people take credit from different NGOs and banks. The credit accessibility of the respondents revealed that only 25% sampled respondent had access to credit while 75% had no access to credit. It was found that only 31% respondents had savings and 69% had no savings. 47 Fatema et al.; AJAEES, 39(1): 43-56, 2021; Article no.AJAEES.65075 3.2 Risk Faced by the Respondents national average Bangladesh. The highest average per capita per day kilo calorie intake was received from the rice consumption which is 3696.929 kilo calorie. The second highest contribution to calorie intake came from wheat/flour consumption which was followed by pulse consumption. Psychological hazards refers any difficulties that affects mental wellbeing of tea worker, which results redundancy on work chores. Observed from Table 5, most dissatisfaction was related with their job because of minimum wages which led them to lower per capita income, they also had dissatisfaction with the weekly ration. They had problems regarding sanitation facilities, especially women workers faces difficulties and various health issues. Table 9 shows the results for food security situation of the selected households of the study area. According to the results, 65% of the sample households are measured to be food insecure whose average per capita calorie availability were below 1 (0.77) and 35% households are food secure whose average per capita calorie availability were above 1 (1.36). Compared to national average of 2122 kcal, calorie intake of food secured households was 2891.055 kcal and food insecure households was 1637.738 kcal. The Table 6 depicts the risk facing indices of mechanical and biological hazards. Long hour physical work make tea-workers vulnerable to sprains. Nonetheless, the maximum respondents also agreed that they faced hazards of cuts and injuries for using traditional tools or their own hands. They also face challenges with insect bites, fungal infection, malaria etc. Half of the respondents said that they had ulcer, some other also attached with eczema. According to them, nutritional imbalance, narcotic uses, and food insecurity were the causes of their health hazards. 3.5 Factors Influencing Food Security Status of the Tea Garden Workers Results of logistic regression model are presented in Table 10. Household income, family type and no. of dependent person in family were found significant determining factors of food security in a household. It was obvious that the high income, small family size helped a family to be food secured than others. The income is expected to boost household‘s food production and also access to more quantity and quality food. Household income had significant effect on food security status. The food security status of higher PCI (Per Capita Income) family was additional 0.953 units in index compare to families whose income were less. Family type or size was statistically significant on food security status. The food security status of nuclear families was additional 1.115 unit higher than the families who had joint family. Large household size exerts more pressure on consumption. The food availability declines as family size increases due to population growth. Hence, large family size is more likely related to being food insecure in a household. Having minimum dependent person in a family also found significant than the families who had high dependent persons in family. 3.3 Food Security Status of Household 3.3.1 Access to food Number of full meals taken by the family members/day is shown in Table 7. In a normal situation, most of the household had enough food availability. However, during adverse situation, 15% of the respondents shift their response from at least two meal to one meal per day. This might be due to low wage rate, lack of employment and income generation activities for both male and female members of the households. 3.4 Food Security Status as Household Calorie Availability From the analysis of FCS it has found that 49% respondents are in borderline food consumption pattern and 5% respondents consumption pattern are in poor level. The other 46% of the respondent consumption score are in acceptable level. Consistent with other study by [28,29] the life of tea workers in Ootterbhag and Indanugger tea estate of Bangladesh are vulnerable. Wages are not adequate to meet basic needs and the wage raises are not keeping pace with the cost of living, results support the study reported by [29]. Considering 4.51 average family member the Table 8 illustrates average per capita per day intake of calorie for all food items consumed by the respondent’s family. The overall average daily per capita calorie intake was observed to be 2076.3996 kilo calorie, which is lower than the 48 Fatema et al.; AJAEES, 39(1): 43-56, 2021; Article no.AJAEES.65075 respondent family household is far below the international poverty line (1.90 US$). Therefore, increase of daily and monthly wage and other compensation is most essential so that workers can get rid of deficiencies. Provision of providing sugar and lentil as ration can be introduced along with rice and wheat would be helpful to improve worker's health and nutrition. very helpful for the community, hence, authority in collaboration with the government and NGOs might take necessary action. Food consumption score has found that 49% respondents are in borderline food consumption pattern while 5% and 46% are in poor and acceptable level respectively. The overall average daily per capita calorie intake by tea workers was observed to be 2076.3996 kilo calorie, which is lower than the national average of Bangladesh. Due to lower wage pattern, limited access to nutritious food and high price of food products they have to face food insecurity. Most of the households were measured to be food insecure whose average per capita calorie availability were below 1 (0.77). Though it was hard to consider all the determinants of food security, among independent variables considered, household income, family type and no. of dependent person in family were the significant factors that affecting food security status of the tea workers. These results agree with the findings of [33,38,39], while study found age and education influenced household food insecurity [33], gender, education, farm size, and expenditure had effect on the income vulnerability of tea workers of Bangladesh [40]. These indicate the need to continue investigating the social, agricultural and economic characteristics of agricultural working environments. These results agree with those reported by [30] who established the importance of the socioeconomic conditions of agricultural towns in Panama, this study being fundamental to understand the vulnerability of the population in terms of food security. [29]. Also [30], coincide with our results, due to the vulnerability of the population in terms of food security. It was observed from the analysis that 52% sample respondents were illiterate, these results coincide with those indicated by [31-33]; which establish that this characteristic of the population has a significant impact on the quality of life in the agricultural areas of Nigeria and Venezuela. Nonetheless, the maximum respondents also agreed that they faced various psychological, mechanical and biological hazards, including health problems and there are lack of medical facilities, results similar to study of [29,34]. Both formal and non-formal education may be introduced for the children, awareness campaign regarding, nutrition, health and sanitation practices through motivational programs among the workers must be undertaken. In this sense, the results of [35-37] agree that awareness and education programs would help motivate agricultural workers and manage knowledge for collective benefit. In this context, this type of study developed in Bangladesh, becomes an instrument to achieve a better use of land based on economic, ecological and social sustainability. Within this theme, the agriculture developed by the tea workers from Ootterbhag and Indanugger tea estate of Moulvibazar will be seen to benefit as more rational use of natural resources is achieved, through planning and ordering of space. The workers cannot afford the cost of energy and electricity due to their limited wage. Easy access to gas and electricity with free of cost would be Table 1. Food groups and weights for calculating FCS Food Items Maize, maize porridge, rice, sorghum, millet pasta, bread, cassava, potatoes and sweet potatoes and other cereals. Beans. Peas, groundnuts and cashew nuts Vegetables and leaves Fruits Beef, goat, poultry, pork, eggs, and fish Milk, yogurt, and others dairy products Sugar and sugar products Oils, fats, and butter Condiments Source: WFP 2008 49 Food Groups Cereals and Tuber Weight 2 Pulse Vegetables Fruits Meat and Fish Milk Sugar Oil Condiments 3 1 1 4 4 0.5 0.5 0 Fatema et al.; AJAEES, 39(1): 43-56, 2021; Article no.AJAEES.65075 Table 2. Threshold level for FCS Threshold 0-21 21.5-35 >35 Profile (Food Consumption) Poor Borderline Acceptable Threshold with regular oil and sugar consumption level 0-28 28.5-42 >42 Source: WFP&FAO 2008, Kabir, 2018 [23,24] Table 3. Nutrient composition Items Coarse Rice Atta (Wheat) Dal Lentil Fish Rohi Telapia Mrigal Pangas Sarputi Egg Energy (per 100 gm.) kcal 365 341 344 343 159 120.55 127.50 98 170.23 161 179 Items Meat Beef Mutton Chicken Duck Vegetables Potato Brinjal Helenchashak Data shak Energy (per 100 gm.) kcal 146 136.40 194 125.29 130 48 80.20 42 41 28.66 Items Duck Milk (Cows) Oil (Soybean) Spices Onion Garlic Chili Turmeric Dry fish Hen Energy (per 100 gm.)kcal 205.97 70 900 146 50 145 40.71 349 279.79 153 Source: WFP, 1988 [25,26]. Note: 1 medium egg is 63 to 73 gram (average 68 gram) Table 4. Independent variables with their category and codes Variables Gender of household head Category and codes Male=1, Female=0 Household income Educational status Above PCI=1, Below PCI=0 Literate=1, Illiterate=0 Family type Nuclear family=1, Joint family=0 Variables Association with cooperatives Loan accessibility No. of dependent persons in family Safe drinking water facilities 50 Category and codes Yes-1, No=0 Yes=1, No=2 Low=1, High=0 Yes =1, No=0 Fatema et al.; AJAEES, 39(1): 43-56, 2021; Article no.AJAEES.65075 Table 5. Psychological hazards faced by tea workers in Moulvibazar, Bangladesh Sl No. Problems 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Employers attitude Sick leave Maternity leave Satisfaction with weekly salary Satisfied with job Satisfaction with weekly ration Sanitation facilities Scope of child education Satisfaction with medical facilities Extent of problems Fairly dissatisfied Little satisfied 2 1 7 73 34 62 32 66 37 12 54 33 54 29 28 61 21 54 57 35 Highly dissatisfied 3 4 2 2 51 13 17 0 0 8 Satisfied 0 16 2 0 0 0 0 11 25 0 RFI Rank Order 99 136 136 136 239 180 188 96 173 8 6 6 6 1 3 2 9 4 Source: Author`s calculation, 2018 Table 6. Mechanical and Biological hazards faced by tea workers in Moulvibazar, Bangladesh Sl. No. Mechanical Hazards 1 2 3 4 Biological Hazards 1 2 3 4 5 6 Problems Extent of Problems Agree 2 Disagree 1 RFI Rank order Cuts Injury Sprains Others 85 86 82 2 15 14 18 76 185 186 182 80 2 1 3 4 Insect Bite Fungal infection Malaria Ulcer Dermatitis Eczema 90 16 51 51 2 48 10 84 49 49 98 52 190 116 151 151 102 148 1 5 2 2 6 4 Source: Author`s calculation, 2018 51 Fatema et al.; AJAEES, 39(1): 43-56, 2021; Article no.AJAEES.65075 Table 7. Distribution of the respondents based on the number of meal taken per day Status of access to food Three meals/day Two meals/day One meal/day Normal situation No. of respondents 98 02 00 Percentage 98 02 00 Source: Author`s calculation, 2018 Adverse situation No. of respondents 30 55 15 Percentage 30 55 15 Table 8. Calorie intake from different food items by family members of the households (Kcal/day/capita) Food items Rice Wheat/Flour Vegetables Pulse Fish Eggs Chicken Beef Duck Edible oil Garlic Sugar Chili Onion Turmeric Tea Dried fish Calorie intake (kcal/capita/day) 3696.929 1797.557 594.7669 1076.229 396.1371 169.3647 244.2409 194.8571 18.57143 125.4857 112.6857 294.991 17.30175 129.2857 118.4107 7.951 191.856 Source: Author’s estimation based on field survey, 2018 52 Fatema et al.; AJAEES, 39(1): 43-56, 2021; Article no.AJAEES.65075 Table 9. Food security indices of tea workers in Moulvibazar, Bangladesh Particulars Food security index Percentage of households Per capita daily calorie availability (Average) Food secured households 1.36 35 2891.055 Source: Author’s estimation, 2018 Food insecure households 0.77 65 1637.738 All 0.978 100 2076.399 Table 10. Binary logistic regression analysis of factors influencing food security status of the tea garden workers Independent variables Safe drinking water facilities ® Yes No Gender of Household head Female® Male Household income Below PCI® Above PCI Educational status ® Illiterate Literate Family type ® Joint Nuclear Association with cooperatives No® Yes Loan accessibility No® Yes No of dependent person in family ® High Low Co-efficient (β) P-value Odds ratio ---22.214 --0.999 --0.000 --1.734 --0.104 --5.662 --0.953 --0.063* --3.341 ------0.842 --0.429 --2.593 -_----1.115 --0.026** --1.328 ---0.138 --.0872 --0.871 --0.270 --0.748 --1.310 --1.846 --0.016** --1.697 ® Source: Author’s estimation based on field survey, 2018. Note: denotes the reference category; *and ** indicates the levels of significance at 10 and 5% respectively 53 Fatema et al.; AJAEES, 39(1): 43-56, 2021; Article no.AJAEES.65075 4. CONCLUSION As Bangladesh is marching towards becoming a middle-income country, it is right time to mainstream all the communities in the path of development by fulfilling their basic rights. Hence, it is highly essential to increase the daily wages, ration, sanitation, healthcare and education facilities of the workers and their family members. Appropriate wage, fulfillment of basic needs and healthy food intake can improve the productivity of the laborers. It is also pertinent to create a good relationship among owners, managerial staffs and workers. The study covers only one tea estate of Bangladesh, therefore, the findings of this study should be interpreted with considerable caution to generalize for the all tea garden workers as a whole. The recommendation for future research is to replicate the research with a large sample size that spread over different tea estates of Bangladesh. 4. 5. 6. CONSENT 7. As per international standard informed and written participant consent has been collected and preserved by the authors. 8. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Authors are thankful to the editor, the reviewers for their thoughtful comments and suggestions on this paper. Authors thank the authority of Ootterbhag and Indanuger tea estate and to all tea workers who supported for collecting data and information. Thanks to Prof. Dr. Jasim Uddin Ahmed for helping in data collection and funding through his research project (funded by the University Grants Commission (UGC) of Bangladesh). 9. 10. COMPETING INTERESTS Authors have interests exist. declared that no 11. competing REFERENCES 1. 2. 3. BTB: Bangladesh tea board. Annual Statistical Report; 2020. Ahmmed F, Hossain MI. A study report on working conditions of tea plantation workers in Bangladesh. Dhaka: International Labor Organization; 2016. UCA News. 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