RANGPUR, Sept 8, 2020 (BSS) – Farmers are expecting an excellent maize production despite floods as its harvest is nearing completion during the Kharif-1 season in Rangpur agriculture region.
Officials of the Department of Agricultural Extension (DAE) said farmers already completed harvest of maize on 24,998 hectares of land and produced 2.18 lakh tonnes of the crop with an average excellent yield rate of 8.75 tonnes per hectare.
Earlier, the DAE had fixed a target of producing 2.27 lakh tonnes of maize from 26,100 hectares of land while farmers finally cultivated the crop on 25,103 hectares, less by 997 hectares of land than the fixed farming target for the region.
Meanwhile, the recent floods damaged standing maize crop on 28 hectares of land in the region where farmers already completed harvest of the crop on 24,998 hectares of land by Monday out of the remaining crop on 25,075 hectares of land.
“Despite a little shortfall in achieving the fixed farming target and damages caused by floods, farmers are expecting an excellent maize production this season,” said Additional Director of the DAE for Rangpur region Agriculturist Muhammad Ali.
So far, farmers have achieved an average yield rate of 8.75 tonnes of maize per hectare of land against the fixed yield rate of 8.70 tonnes per hectare in the region.
“As a result of cultivation of high yielding varieties of maize on more land areas, farmers are getting an excellent yield rate of the less irrigation water consuming cereal crop during this Kharif-1 season,” Ali said.
“Earlier, farmers produced a record 10.41 lakh tonnes of maize from 1,00,345 hectares of land exceeding the fixed production target of 10.12 lakh tonnes from 99,636 hectares of land by 2.86 percent during the last Rabi season,” he said.
He said maize cultivation is increasing consistently as farmers are showing keen interest in expanding its farming both on the main land and char areas thrice round the year after getting repeated bumper productions with excellent prices in recent years.
“Along with meeting huge demand for maize in the flourishing local poultry and animal husbandry sectors, its expanded cultivation is contributing to cut poverty and help farmers in improving livelihoods and achieving self-reliance,” Ali added.
Farmers Dulal Mian, Aiyub Ali, Badrul Alam and Ariful Haque of different villages in Rangpur Sadar upazila said they were selling newly harvested maize at better rates between Taka 750 and 800 per mound (every 40 kilogram).
Agriculturist Dr Md Abdul Mazid, who got the Independence Award 2018 Medal (food security), said there are immense potentialities to further increase maize production through bringing the huge abandoned char lands of the northern region.
“Maize farming is more profitable than many other crops and farmers are increasing its cultivation using the conservation agriculture technologies to get better output at reduced cost,” he said.
He lauded various realistic steps of the government like distribution of incentives among farmers to further boost production of low-irrigation water consuming maize to ensure food security.