Staff Reporter :
Agriculture experts at a programme here on Tuesday stressed on achieving food security and reduction of hunger and malnutrition through increased environmentally sustainable agriculture production in the country’s southern region.
“Salinity, water logging, lack of proper irrigation facilities and natural disasters are hampering agriculture in the region. The southern region is the most vulnerable and it lags behind other parts of the country in agriculture”, they said it while addressing a seminar organized by BRAC at its Mohakhali office.
Anwar Faruque, Director General, Seed Wing and Additional Secretary, Ministry of Agriculture, attended the function as the chief guest. Mohammad Abu Hanif Mia, Director General, Department of Agriculture Extension (DAE), Dr. Mohammad Kamal Uddin, Executive Chairman of Bangladesh Agricultural Research Council (BARC) and Dr Babar Kabir, Senior Director, BRAC, among others, spoke on the occasion.
Dr. Mohammad Sirajul Islam, Programme Head, Agriculture and Food Security Programme of BRAC, presented the key-note paper on BRAC’s Intervention in Increasing Resilience of Agriculture and Aquaculture Systems in the South.
“There are many lands lying uncultivated in the southern region. Those lands should be brought under cultivation. Steps should be taken to ensure better monitoring facilities for the farmers because unsold products affect the future products.
They called for making more investment and bringing the South under modern agriculture. They stressed on coordination between the Agriculture and LGRD Ministries.
They opined for taking plan for boosting horticulture and shrimp and vegetable farming, converting single cropping area to double or triple cropping area to enhance food
security, introducing short-duration HYV rice to accommodate high-value non-rice crop in the popular rice-rice pattern and introduction of stress tolerant rice to combat the adverse effect of climate change.
Upholding the interests of farmers, they underscored that all should work together for enhancing agriculture in the region.
In the keynote paper revealed that about 1.0 million rice land is severely affected by salinity in dry and flooding in wet season of coastal region of Bangladesh. Farmers mostly grow low-yielding traditional rice in monsoon (Aman) Season. Most of these lands remain fallow in the dry (Rabi/Boro) and pre-monsoon (Aus) seasons. The productivity is very low, much less than most of Bangladesh.
Agriculture experts at a programme here on Tuesday stressed on achieving food security and reduction of hunger and malnutrition through increased environmentally sustainable agriculture production in the country’s southern region.
“Salinity, water logging, lack of proper irrigation facilities and natural disasters are hampering agriculture in the region. The southern region is the most vulnerable and it lags behind other parts of the country in agriculture”, they said it while addressing a seminar organized by BRAC at its Mohakhali office.
Anwar Faruque, Director General, Seed Wing and Additional Secretary, Ministry of Agriculture, attended the function as the chief guest. Mohammad Abu Hanif Mia, Director General, Department of Agriculture Extension (DAE), Dr. Mohammad Kamal Uddin, Executive Chairman of Bangladesh Agricultural Research Council (BARC) and Dr Babar Kabir, Senior Director, BRAC, among others, spoke on the occasion.
Dr. Mohammad Sirajul Islam, Programme Head, Agriculture and Food Security Programme of BRAC, presented the key-note paper on BRAC’s Intervention in Increasing Resilience of Agriculture and Aquaculture Systems in the South.
“There are many lands lying uncultivated in the southern region. Those lands should be brought under cultivation. Steps should be taken to ensure better monitoring facilities for the farmers because unsold products affect the future products.
They called for making more investment and bringing the South under modern agriculture. They stressed on coordination between the Agriculture and LGRD Ministries.
They opined for taking plan for boosting horticulture and shrimp and vegetable farming, converting single cropping area to double or triple cropping area to enhance food
security, introducing short-duration HYV rice to accommodate high-value non-rice crop in the popular rice-rice pattern and introduction of stress tolerant rice to combat the adverse effect of climate change.
Upholding the interests of farmers, they underscored that all should work together for enhancing agriculture in the region.
In the keynote paper revealed that about 1.0 million rice land is severely affected by salinity in dry and flooding in wet season of coastal region of Bangladesh. Farmers mostly grow low-yielding traditional rice in monsoon (Aman) Season. Most of these lands remain fallow in the dry (Rabi/Boro) and pre-monsoon (Aus) seasons. The productivity is very low, much less than most of Bangladesh.
