Livestock farmers in Nawabganj, Dinajpur, are struggling with a shortage of fodder and high prices. A bundle of straw from the new rice crop sells for Tk 20 to 30, and straw, bran and green grass all cost more than they did.
The upazila has 95 dairy farms, 85 goat farms and 38 sheep farms. Farmers complain that while feed has become dearer, the price of milk and of cattle at sale has not risen in step, so their margins are shrinking. If it goes on, they say, small farmers may give up rearing cattle.
Dairy farmer Jahangir Hossain Jewel said a sack of bran that used to cost Tk 2,200 to 2,300 now costs about Tk 2,500, and each Napier grass cutting costs Tk 45 to 50. Without regular feed the milk drops, he said, so he has no choice but to buy at the higher prices.
Saheb Ali, a small farmer from Kundan village in Daudpur union, said the money that once bought several days' feed now buys far less, and finding it on top of the household's other costs has become hard.
Farmers point out that the cost is not only straw and bran: there is oil cake, green grass, labour, treatment and care. If they cut the quantity or quality of feed to cope, the animals' nutrition suffers, and with it weight gain, milk yield and fertility.
Nawabganj upazila livestock officer Dr Bipul Kumar Chakraborty said straw alone is not enough: animals need plenty of green grass, clean water and, where needed, a balanced concentrate. Farmers can grow Napier and other suitable grasses around their homes, he said, and storing straw in season eases the pressure when feed runs short.
Reported by Krishi Shomoy's Dinajpur correspondent.
Photo: A farmer walks his cattle past harvested paddy fields and straw stacks, A S M Jobaer / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Source: Krishi Shomoy
Comments
(0)