DEPARTMENT OVERVIEW

         The Department of Rural Sociology was established in 1962 and is part and parcel of the Faculty of Agricultural Economics and Rural Sociology.  Experienced and foreign qualified staff is conducting the academic and research activities in the light of national agenda for socio-economic development.Presently the Department offers four-degree programs, which are M.Sc. and Ph.D. in Rural Sociology, M.A. Sociology and M.Sc. in Population Sciences.  The Ph.D. program is particularly designed in the light of the Higher Education Commission’s agenda for quality education and research. Almost all the Ph.D teachers are on the approved list of supervisors of the HEC.  The staff  has  been conducting their research on the issues of national and international significance.

    The worth mentioning areas are mother-child health, reproductive health, correlates of human fertility, determinants of migration and mortality, family conflicts, belief and value system, social change and development, transfer of technology and impact assessment of development programs. At present about 250 students are doing their Master degree studies.

Keeping in view the significance of population, recently the department started M.Sc.  in Population Sciences. This program will provide the trained manpower and population experts to the country for strengthening the teaching and research activities in field of population and will also assist the provincial and federal governments to frame population policies and strategies. Through this program the technical assistance will be provided to program managers and policy makers for effective and efficient management of national population program. Right now there are 13 teachers working with the Department of Rural Sociology, 4 of them are Ph.D. and rest of them have master degree in Rural Sociology or Sociology.

Training in the Department of Rural Sociology is not limited to the teaching of basic and advanced concepts of the subjects, the students are made to comprehend and integrate these concepts with the sustainable development and poverty alleviation. The training encourages students to do practical problems independently. The staff also undertakes contractual research for a number of public and private agencies.