Agricultural College and Research Institute, Killikulam, Tuticorin district, Tamil Nadu - 628252
The land degradation and its impct on migration-decisions of farm households have been studied under resource-degraded situation (sodic soil areas) with the objectives of assessing the value loss in agriculture due to sodicity in soils and finding the influence of affected lands on migration participation in rural sample households in Paramakudi and Vilathikulam taluks of Ramanathapuram and Tuticorn districts of Southern Tamil Nadu. The study is based on data collected from 160 affected and 80 non-affected sample households from the selected districts during the year 2003–04. The output from agriculture has been found substantially lower in the affected than non-affected farms. The probable reason for this reduced output could be the deterioration in land quality due to the increasing salt-content. To capture the household-decision on migration, probit model has been used. The value loss from agriculture due to land degradation (sodicity impact) has been found very high in paddy and millet crops, followed by pulse crops. But, the value difference due to yield damage has been comparatively low in chillies and cotton. The analysis of total family income has revealed that amongst various income sources, non-farm income constituted a major portion of the total income, followed by income from crop production in both the affected and non-affected farms. The variables such as, age of migrants, family size and education level have been found as the major determinatnts for migration in the affected category of farm families. But in the non-affected cateogy, variables such as, education and age have been observed to be the significant determinants of migration.
