Why Employees Shift from Traditional Tea Estate to Urban Area Jobs?

Abstract

In the Sri Lankan context, the tea industry, which was initiated by the British playing an essential role in the economy. Even though relative contribution has decreased in the past recent years, still the tea industry adorns a significant role and maintain an essential place in the economy. Outgoing labours from one plantation organization to another organization is a new situation in Sri Lanka. Shifting labours from the tea industry to urban area jobs in the Sri Lankan context has been not researched yet. The current study was conducted to identify what are the most affecting factors to tea estate labours shift to the urban area jobs. The current study was conducted as a crosssectional field study among the sample of 60 labours already shifted from the tea industry to urban area jobs in Sri Lanka. Primary data was collected through a selfdeveloped questionnaire distributed via printed on a paper as a questionnaire survey. Primary data were analyzed with the support of the correlation matrix, extraction sums of squared loadings, component matrix. It was found that all factors; salary, supervision, and social influence are affected for the decision to shift from tea industry to urban jobs. Based on the findings, it could be recommended to tea estate authorities on how to get continuous labour supply.