RAJSHAHI, June 10, 2020 (BSS) – Farmers have harvested more than 11.42 lakh tonnes of onion from 85,116 hectares of land in all eight districts in Rajshahi division during the past harvesting season.
The harvested yield is more than 1.75 lakh tonnes higher than that of the production target set by the Department of Agriculture Extension (DAE), said Sudhendra Nath Roy, Additional Director of DAE.
“We had fixed the target of producing around 9.67 lakh tonnes of onion from 79,985 hectares of land in the division but the farmers cultivated the crop on 85,116 hectares of land,” he said.
They cultivated the spicy cash crop on additional land with hope of catching the exorbitant price that prevailed earlier and the additional production contributes a lot towards restoring a tolerable situation in the onion markets at present.
Sudhendra Roy said the DAE had adopted various time-fitting measures including farmers training and providing incentives to them to boost the onion production.
Around 2,500 farmers were given seeds and fertilizers valued at around Taka 42.84 lakh free of cost for onion farming on 2,500 hectares of land in the division under the rabi season’s agricultural incentive programme.
Besides, each of another 550 farmers was given 130 grams of seed, 10 kilograms of diammonium phosphate and ten kilograms of muriate of potus for cultivating the summer onion in the division.
On an average, the farmers got 16.84 tonnes per hectare yield this season. The newly harvested onion is being sold at Taka 1,400 to 1,600 per mound according to size and quality at local markets.
Anwar Hossain, 48, a farmer of Nandigran village under Durgapur Upazila, said he had cultivated onion on five bigha of land and harvested satisfactory yield. He is also happy over his selling price.
He said there is a bright prospect of bringing more acreage under onion farming in the region as the farmers are very much interested to cultivate the crop for its feature to consume less water.
Hafizur Rahman, a farmer of Mushribhuja village under Volahat Upazila, said he is very happy cultivating various less-water consuming crops like onions.
“I had to face many troubles to manage irrigation water for boro cultivation,” he said. But, the cultivation of water-saving crops is suitable for the farmers of the area, he added.
Ishrafil Haque, a volunteer of Nizampur village under Nachole Upazila, said farming of less-water consuming crops is increasing in the area every year.
Prof Chowdhury Sarwar Jahan of Department of Geology and Mining in Rajshahi University said promotion of less-water consuming crops in the Barind area is a good sign for lessening the gradually mounting pressure on its underground water.
Various government and non-government entities including Barind Multipurpose Development Authority (BMDA) have been conducting various motivational programmes among the farmers to promote the water-saving crops in the drought-prone Barind area.
More than 1,000 volunteers are motivating farmers to cultivate less water consuming crops through water resource management on behalf of the ‘Integrated Water Resource Management (IWRM)’ Project.
DASCOH Foundation has been implementing the IWRM project in 1,280 drought-hit villages of 39 Union Parishad and three municipalities in eight upazilas of Rajshahi, Naogaon and Chapainawabganj districts with financial support of Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation since 2015.