Farmers in Joypurhat have begun cutting and threshing early varieties of aman rice. Yields in the fields are good, but prices at market are lower than they hoped, and growers say paddy is selling below what it cost them to produce.
According to the district agriculture office, the aman target this season was 70,095 hectares and 70,110 hectares were planted. About 878 hectares of local and high-yielding varieties have been harvested so far.
The varieties being cut include the high-yielding BRRI dhan 75, 87, 90, 17 and 7, along with hybrids such as Dhani Gold. While harvesting, farmers are also preparing their land for the coming rabi crops.
Md Nasir Uddin, a farmer from Madhyapara village in Khetlal upazila, said paddy fetches no price while pesticides and other inputs cost far more. Farmers also lost heavily on potatoes last year and cannot now recover their costs, he said: "If the price of paddy rises a little, we will survive."
Md Mehedi Hasan, the district agricultural marketing officer, said Joypurhat produces large amounts of rice as well as potatoes, and farmers have told his office they are not getting a fair price as early aman reaches the market. The Department of Agricultural Marketing is advising them not to sell cheaply now but to store some paddy at home and sell later when prices improve.
He said markets are being monitored so that no group can buy paddy cheaply, hoard it and unsettle prices, and legal action will be taken against any irregularity found. The report is by Banglanews24 district correspondent Shahidul Islam Sabuj.
Photo: Mahmuda NazninH / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Source: Banglanews24
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