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Growers of early variety potatoes earn fast buck

S DILIP Roy, Lalmonirhat
Early variety potatoes have already started to appear in markets and the farmers are selling those at higher prices.
Many traders are sending the potatoes to different districts, including capital Dhaka, to make some fast buck.
The newly harvested varieties are now selling at rates between Tk 50 and Tk 55 per kilogram in local markets although sowing of potato seeds will continue till first week of February next year, said growers and traders.
The crop was selling at Tk 70 to 80 two weeks ago when it appeared in the local markets first, they added.
Agriculture officials said, a good number of farmers are reaping benefit from early variety potatoes
as they had cultivated those after harvesting the short duration variety aman paddy at different villages in five upazilas in the district.
Farmer Meher Ali Sarker at Karnapur village in Lalmonirhat Sadar said that he cultivated early variety potatoes on two bighas of land after harvesting paddy and now making a huge profits from the vegetable.
" I have already sold 1800 kgs of potatoes at the rate Tk 50 to 65 per kg in the local markets in the last three days and I hope to sell more 500 kgs in the next one week."
Farmer Nur Islam of Bhadai village in Aditmari upazila said he also harvested potatoes and earned excellent profits from those.
"I have already earned Tk 85 thousand by selling early
variety potatoes from my two bighas land. "The cultivation expenditure was Tk 33 thousand," he said.
Lalmonirhat AED office sources said, around 11,000 hectares of land were brought under potato cultivation in five upazilas of the district this year.
Of the total, 85 hectares were cultivated for early variety potatoes following harvest of short duration aman paddy.
Deputy Director of the Lalmonirhat AED Abdul Mazid said, a lot of farmers are now very happy as they are making a good profit.
The agriculture departments, seed dealers and a few NGOs provided quality potato seeds and inputs including fertilisers to the farmers to make potato farming successful, he said.