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Govt plans seed drive to offset flood damage

REAZ AHMAD
Amid fears of a substantial loss to aman rice in recent monsoon flooding, the government plans to offset the damage through a seed supply drive in the late-sowing period and ensure better harvests of the next crops including boro and winter vegetables.
Aman constitutes more than 40 percent of the country's yearly cereal production with over 10 million tonnes of average annual output, but the early deluge this year -- only comparable to the 1988 and 1998 floods -- badly hit broadcast aman and seedbeds.
The government has already taken up a programme of providing five kg of seeds and seedlings and 25 kg of fertiliser for each of the 2.66 million
flood-affected small and marginal farmers having up to 2.5 acres of land.
In many areas, aman growers have missed the opportunity of sowing high-yielding varieties (HYV) as the sowing season is almost over and they are now left with the option of sowing local varieties of aman.
"Aman sowing will be late and in many places it will not grow at all. A significant portion of the late-season aman will be local varieties, not the HYV. And as such, production will plummet," said a field report prepared by an agricultural input marketing company.
But Agriculture Minister MK Anwar told The Daily Star recently he did not anticipate any substantial loss of aman crop because of late sowing and
local-variety sowing.
Referring to his extensive visit to some of the worst flood-hit districts --Sylhet, Moulvibazar, Hobiganj, Brahmanbaria and Narsingdi-- Anwar said, "I have seen farmers did not wait for government or someone else to come up with seeds, rather they started work on their own."
He mentioned that the Department of Agriculture Extension (DAE) workers and seed growers were making efforts to make seedbeds wherever they got dry lands -- even inside Brahmanbaria stadium, on playgrounds of schools and on the premises of union parishad offices. They want to ensure immediate delivery of seeds and seedlings to farmers after the recession of flood
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waters, he added.
Anwar admitted the loss of aus rice almost wholly due the deluge in 46 districts out of the 64 for almost a month from early July to early August. "We still hope to avoid much loss of aman and to reap the maximum out of the next boro season," he said.
On the post-flood agricultural rehabilitation programme, the minister explained that not necessarily all the 2.66 million small and marginal farmers would get aman seeds from the government, rather they would get seeds free-of-cost up to December, in phases. Many of them would get aman seeds, many would get wheat seeds and many others boro, maize and vegetable seeds, he said.
Citing an instance, Anwar said the rehabilitation programme in Narsingdi district will cover 1,08,000 small and marginal farmers out of a
total of 1,73,000 farmers, who were affected by the recent floods.
"From mid-August, we'll provide them with seeds and seedlings of 10 crops including aman, boro, wheat, maize, vegetables and mustards for cultivating those in 34,050 acres of land till December this year. This will require 605 tonnes of seeds, of which we've already distributed 37 tonnes of aman seeds," the minister said.
Talking to this correspondent last week, Deputy Director of the DAE at Narsingdi Bipad Bhonjon Das said that as aman sowing season was running out, they were procuring seeds and seedlings through 'on the spot quotations' so that farmers could get those in time.
" Despite the damage of many seedbeds across the country and delay in sowing aman, about 90 percent of aman production target can still be achieved," he hoped.