Abstract: In one sentence Bangladesh is a large village. There are 59,990 villages in Bangladesh and about 80% of the country’s total population of about 120 million to live in the rural areas which primarily depend on a poorly developed agriculture for livelihood (www.discoverybangladesh.com). The report shows that around 60% of total people are employed in the agriculture sector which contributed 14.10% of total GDP in 2017-18 (www.thedailystar.net) according to BBS data. Though livelihood of maximum rural people is agriculture there are some people who earn their livelihood through non-farming activities like shopkeeping, teaching, agro-processing, service rendering as a barber, shop boy, welding, carpenter, mason etc. and manufacturing non-firm items in their cottages. The objective of the study is to investigate whether banks branches and MFIs play a role in creating earning opportunity for rural people through non-farming activities and how they play a role. Extensive literature has been studied to know the fact. Data was collected through an unstructured questionnaire. Based on the findings the report has been prepared. It was explored that bank branches are not available in a rural area but MFIs are available. It has also been explored that MFIs have a significant role in creating the opportunity for rural people to earn a livelihood through non-farm activities. But they have huge scope to improve the rural economy by providing more support to the rural people with more earning opportunity creation. This study will help students, researchers, banks, MFIs and Government to know the status of rural non farm activities. It will also give further research guideline to the researchers.
Keywords: Non-farm activities, Rural people, Banks, MFIs and Rural economy.