Almost all the cardamom Bangladesh uses is imported, and good cardamom sells for Tk 4,000 to 6,000 a kg. Commercial cardamom gardens have not succeeded in the country before. After long effort, farmer Shahjahan Ali of Benapole village in Sharsha, Jashore, is now seeing hope with green cardamom.
Seeing the high price of cardamom at Dhaka's Chawkbazar in 2012, he began looking for ways to grow it. Wild plants he collected from around the country had no aroma, so he later planted small green cardamom seedlings brought from Africa and started the main project in 2016.
A cyclone in the south-west in November 2019 destroyed his entire garden and set him back several years. In late 2020 he replanted under the shade of mahogany trees. The plants are now over three-and-a-half years old; long shoots are emerging from the base and flowering, and small pods are setting, which take about 120 days to mature.
He says the plants gain the strength to flower two to two-and-a-half years after planting, give a small crop in the third year and yield more after that. A mature plant can give 200 grams to 1 kg of dried cardamom a year and can bear for up to 20 years.
Photo: B.navez / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0)
Source: Dinajpur TV
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