Impact of Urbanization on the Standard of Living of Farmers in Injil District of Herat Province

Abstract

This research was conducted to study the Impact of urbanization on farmers' living standards in the Injil district of Herat province of Afghanistan in 2019. Based on the research requirements, four villages within the radius of five kilometers of districts’ centers as villages with high urban influence and four villages outside the five kilometers of districts’ centers as villages with low urban influence have been selected. Ten farmers (a total of 80 farmers) were randomly selected from each town. An ex post facto research design was applied to this research. Pre-prepared questionnaires were distributed to the respondents, collected data were analyzed statistically, and the findings showed that forty percent of the farmers in the villages with high urban influence had high living standards. 30% and 20% of farmers in villages with high and low urban influence have taken up non-agricultural activities and turned to business. 95% of the farmers mentioned high production costs as the main reason for changing jobs to non-agricultural activities. This was followed by other reasons, such as the non-existence of a special market for agricultural products (90.00%). Ninety percent of the farmers continued their agricultural activities due to financial constraints, and 76.25% did not know about other jobs.