Kurigram farmers turn to climate-resilient methods to cope with the heat

In July 2026, farmers in Kurigram were turning to organic and climate-resilient methods to cope with rising temperatures and falling rainfall. According to a Jagonews24 report of 15 July 2026, 20 farmers in two villages of Chinai union, Rajarhat upazila, had cut back on chemical fertiliser and pesticide and were growing vegetables with mulching, trichocompost, pheromone traps and coloured sticky traps.

Citing the Rajarhat weather and agricultural observation centre, the report said the district's maximum temperature rose by 5.3 degrees Celsius over the six years from July 2019 to July 2025. Climate change had created a new reality in the district's weather, and farming felt it directly.

Kurigram is a district in northern Bangladesh on the Indian border. It covers 2,245.04 square kilometres and had 2,329,160 people at the 2022 census. The Jamuna (Brahmaputra), Dharla and Teesta rivers run through it, and river silt has built many chars, or sandbar islands. Rajarhat is one of its nine upazilas; the Teesta and Dharla flow through it, and Chinai is one of its seven unions.

Chinai union parishad chairman Lutfor Rahman said most farmers in this farming area once grew rice and jute. Adapting to the changing weather, many had moved to vegetables, which he said made three to four crops a year possible and raised both farm incomes and employment.

Farmers in Mohidhor and Khondokkhetro villages were using eco-friendly methods on beans, bitter gourd, aubergine, cauliflower, cabbage, cucumber and other vegetables. With support from the development organisation RDRS Bangladesh and the Palli Karma-Sahayak Foundation (PKSF), 20 farmers, among them Lovely Begum, Moslem, Abul Hossain and Minoti Rani, were growing safe crops on about five acres, relying less on chemicals by using trichocompost, mulching paper, yellow, white and blue sticky traps and pheromone traps.

RDRS began in 1972, set up by the Lutheran World Federation to help people affected by the War of Independence, and became an independent national organisation in 1997; food security and the environment are among its areas of work. PKSF was established by the government of Bangladesh in 1990 and provides financial and non-financial services to rural people through grassroots non-governmental organisations.

Lovely Begum said she grew bitter gourd on 20 decimals of land using mulching. With yellow traps and poison bait, she said, she had almost stopped using chemical fertiliser and pesticide; her costs had fallen, the yield was good, and profits would rise further if market prices held.

Abul Hossain said he used to apply chemical fertiliser and pesticide regularly. Now, using organic fertiliser, pheromone traps and coloured sticky traps, he was getting good results, spending less on inputs and seeing fewer disease and pest attacks.

A pheromone trap uses an insect's sex pheromone to draw insects in and catch them. The traps these farmers use were developed by the Bangladesh Agricultural Research Institute (BARI), whose design uses cue-lure and soapy water. They are used on many vegetables, from gourds and cucumber to aubergine and cabbage.

Trichocompost is compost enriched with the beneficial fungus Trichoderma. Mulching means covering the soil around plants with a layer such as straw or plastic sheeting; it conserves soil moisture, stabilises soil temperature and reduces weed growth. With plastic mulch, crops grow through slits or holes in the thin sheeting.

Rajarhat upazila agriculture officer Mst Saifunnahar Sathi said organic fertiliser and compost raise the soil's water-holding capacity, and mulching keeps the soil moist for longer. During a heatwave, she said, it was important to:

• avoid transplanting new seedlings;
• avoid using more fertiliser or pesticide than needed;
• watch the field regularly to control pests and diseases.

Abdullah Al Mamun, deputy director of the agricultural extension office in Kurigram, said surviving extreme heat requires advance planning, conserving soil moisture, using organic fertiliser and following integrated pest management. District and upazila agriculture offices, he said, provide training, farmer field schools, demonstration plots and technical support on organic fertiliser, pheromone traps and integrated pest management.

Farmers can get advice on soil health, crop management and eco-friendly pest control from their local agriculture office, he said, and sub-assistant agriculture officers help them in the field.

Photo: Tanvir Rahat / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)

Sources: Jagonews24, The Independent, Lutheran World Federation, Wikipedia (Kurigram District, Rajarhat Upazila, Palli Karma-Sahayak Foundation, Mulch)