RANGPUR, Feb 22, 2020 (BSS) – An excellent flowering in litchi trees
continues amid favorable climatic condition with advent of the spring
predicting plentiful yield of the fruit this season in Rangpur agriculture
region.
Officials of the Department of Agricultural Extension (DAE) said about
80 percent of litchi trees in the orchards on some 1,700 hectares of land in
all five districts of the region have already bloomed as the process
continues in the region.
“The superb budding in litchi trees has created a huge prospect of
bounteous production of the juiciest, fleshy and tasty seasonal fruit this
season,” said Deputy Director of the DAE at its regional office Agriculturist
Md. Moniruzzaman.
The farmers are expanding litchi farming every year on commercial basis
in the region as many of them have changed fortune through its cultivation
getting repeated bumper production with excellent market price in recent
years.
“The farmers are producing litchi in the tune of 15,000 to 16,000 tonnes
worth about Taka 150 crore on an average adopting latest technologies with
the DAE assistance every year in the region during the last ten years,” he
said.
The process of litchi flowering will continue till the middle of next
month when farmers will become busy with agronomic management in their litchi
orchards for better production.
Deputy Director of DAE for Rangpur Dr. Md. Sarwarul Haque said farmers
are mostly cultivating high yielding, hybrid and local varieties litchi like
China-3, ‘Bedana’, Bombay, ‘Mozaffarpuri’, ‘Madrazi’ and ‘Kanthali’ in their
orchards.
Talking to BSS on their orchards, bigger litchi farmers Abdul Hamid,
Solaiman Ali, Aminur Rahman of different villages in Rangpur Sadar upazila
expressed satisfaction over excellent budding in their litchi trees this
season.
Talking to BSS, Senior Coordinator (Agriculture and Environment) of RDRS
Bangladesh Agriculturist Md. Mamunur Rashid said outstanding blooming in
litchi trees amid favourable climatic condition predicts bumper production of
the fruit this time.
He said litchi farming has already created a silent economic revolution
bringing self-reliance to hundreds of farmers in recent years in all five
districts of Rangpur agriculture the region.
“There is a brighter prospect for further expanding commercial basis
litchi cultivation in the region,” Rashid said, and suggested for
establishing fruit-processing industries in the region to produce export
quality products from litchi and other fruits for export.
Additional Director of the DAE for Rangpur region Agriculturist Muhammad
Ali expressed satisfaction over excellent budding in litchi trees and
predicted a bumper production of the seasonal fruit.
“We have directed the field level agriculture officials to provide
latest technologies and suggestions to farmers to assist them in taking
extensive care of blooming litchi trees in their orchards to get bumper
production of the fruit,” he added.