The study aimed at identifyingrural family' ssocial and economic
developmental needs and infrastructure developmental needs, and finally,
to identify rural families' suggestions to achieve these needs.
The study was conducted in “Besntaway" and “Elziny" villages in
Abohomos district, Beheira Governorate. Focus group discussions were
used to obtain the required information and a check list reflecting the
study's objectives was prepared. About 8 FGD were conducted from both
men and women of the rural families, 4 FGD for each village and each
group included 10-12 persons, with a total number of 95 person (40 male
and 55 females) and data were collected in September 2013.
The most important research findings were as follows:
1- Social Developmental Needs:
* The majority of the respondents indicated that the educational process
quality is very low and they emphasized the importance of monitoring
the instructors and the educational process.
* Participation in formal organizations and NGOs, was low in general and
among women in particular, and they expressed their need for support
from these organizations and to encourage them to participate and be
part of the decision-making process.
* The respondents showed that they attended some extension symposiums
but did not fulfil all their needs and they expressed their need to attend
training courses. The needs for such training courses varied between
males and females, as men focused on the need to have extension fields
training, crop diseases, whereas women expressed their needs for rural
development training i.e. food processing, handcrafts, SMEs, bee
keeping.
* The majority of respondents referred to their inability to get all the
nutrients elements that is necessary for their bodies, due to financial
issues that prevent them from buying foods as a result of their high
prices, besides they allocate most of their budgets to educate their
children. Therefore the respondents suggested to establish institutions
that provide food for them, especially to poor families.
* The results also revealed that the health unit, and hospitals does not have
specialized doctors, and those who practice are inefficient, besides their absence, lack of medical equipment and they required to solve all these
issues.
2- The Economic Developmental Needs
* The majority of respondents indicated the lack of employment
opportunities in the village due to fragmented agricultural landholdings,
which led to internal migration of youth. As for women they lack
appropriate jobs, especially within the traditions and customs that
prevent them from seeking job opportunities outside their villages.
Though, they emphasized the importance of providing them by suitable
job opportunities to secure an income for them, besides providing social
security for incapable families.
* The majority of respondents showed that agriculture extension's role is
very weak in the village, therefore they expressed the need to enhance
the role of agricultural cooperatives to provide inputs with suitable prices
and in time, subsidize agricultural pesticides, in addition to solving
farmers problems, particularly irrigation.
3- Infrastructure Developmental Needs
* The respondents suffer from lack of water supply in their houses,
polluted drinking water, electricity severance, and unpaved village roads.
Thus, they emphasized on the importance of purifying drinking water
and taking deterrent measurements towards those who cause canal
pollution.
* The most important respondents' suggestions were follows: allocation
agricultural lands to young graduates, provide job opportunities to them,
to establish agricultural and nonagricultural productive projects, solve
farmers' problems regarding irrigation, besides providing continuous
awareness to women to overcome social and cultural constraints that
prevent their participation in the development process within their
communities, in addition to providing training in rural development,
establishing projects for recycling farm and house residues, improvement
of the educational process, provide the social -health insurance for
family members, and finally, to have institutions that provide food for
the poor.