Agriculture Minister Dr Md Abdus Shahid has warned that middlemen will be destroyed to control the prices of farm produce in the country.

He gave the warning while speaking to journalists at the Secretariat on 17 January. Earlier, Germany's ambassador in Dhaka, Achim Troster, met the minister.

"We want to use the technology that will let us destroy the middlemen," the minister said. "We want to carry out a market study for consumers. We have to see whether the market is a monopoly or an oligopoly and take action accordingly. But no deadline can be given for that right now."

He said there was no scope to set a deadline for how long it would take to bring the syndicate under control. "But all the sectors involved in controlling the market will come together and take a coordinated step. We want to carry this out with the Prime Minister's direction."

"Stabbing people in the chest for a bigger profit cannot be allowed. The help of market experts will be taken to control the market," he added.

The minister said the goal was to move forward, and farmers must be encouraged to adopt farming with advanced technology. "There are many scientists here and we want to put them to work."

Abdus Shahid said the government did not want to leave any land empty, so that production and harvests would rise. Steps would be taken so that farmers are encouraged to produce wherever crops can be grown, and courtyard meetings would be held if needed.

He said agricultural extension officers work at village level, with three sub-assistant agriculture officers in every union. They visit each area to see what problems the crops have and whether pesticides and fertiliser are being used correctly and in the right doses. That supervision will be strengthened.

On the meeting with the German ambassador, the minister said Bangladesh has had good relations with Germany since independence. "They are our tested friend. Germany is a developed country, and advanced in agriculture too. They will help us in various fields. We are going to build an international-standard packing house and laboratory at Purbachal, and we need Germany's technical cooperation for it. They have assured us of help on that as well."

"We want to export mangoes, pineapples and vegetables to Germany," he said. "We have told them we will not compromise on quality. There will be no compromise on quality in production. We have zero tolerance on this."

Source: Jagonews24. First published in Bengali on The Agro News.