Importing cattle from Myanmar
Bangladesh is a densely populated country. Shortage of grazing land on the one hand and introduction of mechanized farming on the other has made cattle scarce in Bangladesh. Owing to huge population it needs good number of cattle through out the year to meet the protein demand of the country.
Bangladesh has a reasonable border-line with Myanmar at the southeast. Myanmar is now being governed by a democratically elected government after a few decades of autocratic military regime. Bangladesh has been trying to develop relationship with Myanmar by increasing both import and export of business.
Business volume between these two countries has been increasing in slow pace. Bangladesh needs hundreds of thousands sacrificial animals such as cow, ox, bull, sheep, goat etc. especially on the occasion of Eid-ul-Azha. On the other hand, Myanmar has huge number of this kind of animals to trade off. If the formal trading between the two countries is accelerated, the cattle business in Myanmar could find a good market in Bangladesh. The rural people in Myanmar rear cows mostly for getting milk. Ox and bulls do not provide milk. So the farmers of Myanmar want to dispose bull and ox but it has very little market there. In this backdrop, formal and easy import of cattle from Myanmar can be a good source of cattle supply in Bangladesh market. It will be a win-win trading for both the countries.
It is therefore advised that the government would take up the matter with Myanmar and initiate an easy import of cattle from Myanmar.
Md Ashraf Hossain
Ramna,
Dhaka.
