Agri experts in a function here on Wednesday urged the farmers to cultivate flood tolerant paddy on the land of flood prone areas in larger scale to avoid the losses and help the country achieve food security.
“The growers would not be affected economically any more if they farmed flood tolerant varieties- BINA 11 and BRRI Dhan 51 and BRRI Dhan 52 in next seasons as the seedlings of the varieties are not damaged despite remaining those under flood water at a stretch 12 to 15 days”, they said.They made the observations while addressing a crop cutting function on flood tolerant variety BINA 11 at Chowdhuripara (Uryar Char) under Urya union of Fhulchhari upazila in the district.RDRS Bangladesh, a reputed non-government organisation, arranged the function under IRRI (International Rice Research Institute)-STRASA (Stress Tolerant Rice for Poor Farmers in Africa and South Asia) Project funded by Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation of the USA.
Deputy Director (DD) of Department of Agriculture Extension (DAE) Mir Abdur Razzak addressed it as the chief guest and upazila agriculture officer Yousuf Rana Mondal and vice president of Gaibandha Press Club Sarker M. Shahiduzzaman were present as the special guests.With programme manager of RDRS Bangladesh Porsia Rahman in the chair, the function was also addressed, among others, by assistant agriculture officer Saiful Islam, sub assistant agriculture officer Mehedi Hasan, public representative Ahsan Habib and and farmer Asfar Ali Mondal. DD of DAE Mir Abdur Razzak in his speech emphasised on farming of flood tolerant varieties on the low lands which have possibility to go under flood water in coming seasons to get its desired production and attain the cherished goal of food security.He also sought cooperation of all particularly the journalists to disseminate the information regarding flood tolerant paddy farming through publishing positive reports at their respective media to help the growers earn economical profit without any risk caused by inundation.Earlier, the guests formally inaugurated the crop cutting at a field of one farmer Ashraf Ali Mondal. After cutting paddy the farmer expressed his satisfaction over the output as some 18 maunds of paddy were produced from a bigha of land. -BSS, Gaibandha
