RAJSHAHI, March 30, 2019 (BSS)-Prospect of pulse including chickpea
farming is very bright in the region as its topography along with soil
condition is suitable for the cereal crops.
“There are enormous prospects of harvesting additional 10,000 tonnes of
pulse every year in the region,” said Dr Roish Uddin Chowdhury, director of
Pulse Research Center (PRC), an entity of Bangladesh Agriculture Research
Institute (BARI).
Talking to BSS here today, he said PRC has been putting in its level best
efforts to enhance the pulse farming acreage after the best uses of existing
prospects in the region including its vast Barind tract comprising Rajshahi,
Naogaon and Chapainawabganj districts.
Farmers are being encouraged and motivated towards promoting the developed
high yielding varieties of pulses like chickpea, lentil and grasspea for
boosting yield to meet the gradually mounting demands of pulse side by side
with making the farmers benefited.
“We are gradually expanding the modern varieties developed by PRC and BARI
through establishing demonstration blocks in farmers’ fields in a massive
way,” Dr Roish Chowdhury added.
In the current season, lentil demonstration block on 38 hectares of land,
chickpea projection on 27 hectares and grasspea on 16 hectares were
established only in the drought-prone Barind area taking its water-stressed
condition under consideration.
Dr Roish Uddin Chowdhury viewed around 20,000 bigha of land remain fallow
for more than three months after harvesting of transplanted Aman paddy every
year.
There has been a bright scope of bringing the huge land under the three
pulses farming through the best uses of those alongside increasing cropping
intensity amid the current water-stress condition.
To make the farming popular and profitable at the growers’ level, the PRC
has started conducting various programmes including farmers’ motivation and
training, field demonstration and supplying necessary inputs like seed the
years ahead.
Chowdhury said the PRC has planned to bring 1,000 bigha of land under the
above mentioned pulses cultivation at preliminary stage. “We will impart
training to 1,200 farmers to elevate their knowledge of how to cultivate the
cash crop in modern methods,” he said.
Referring to various salient features of the cash crop and immense
prospect of those, he says no additional cost for fertilizer, pesticide and
irrigation is needed to cultivate the sort-term cash crops.
As part of the efforts for expanding the varieties, a farmers’ field day
titled “Block Demonstration on BARI Chhola-5 variety and its Modern Farming”
was organized at Bashnitala area under Godagari Upazila with participation of
more than 50 grassroots farmers both male and female on Friday afternoon.
PRC and On Farm Research Division (OFRD) under BARI jointly organized the
field day programme in association with International Fund for Agricultural
Development (IFAD) and International Agricultural Research for Dry Area
(ICARDA) project.
PRC Director Dr Roish Uddin Chowdhury and its Chief Scientific Officer Dr
Sheikh Mostofa Zaman addressed the meeting as chief and special guests
respectively.
Chaired by Principal Scientific Officer of OFRD Mazharul Anwar the meeting
was addressed, among others, by Bangladesh Part Coordinator of IFAD-ICARDA
Project Akter-Uz-Zaman and Senior Scientific Officer of OFRD (Barind Station)
Dr Shakhawat Hossain.