On the vegetable beds of Md Mohidul Hasan Munna in Dhitpur village, Netrokona Sadar, mulch film holds in soil moisture and stops weeds. Yellow sticky boards and pheromone traps hang over the crop to control insects. He is showing nearby farmers how to use the method to grow vegetables without chemical poisons.
Munna holds an honours degree in history from Netrokona Government College and is now studying for a master's. The family owns about 20 acres of inherited land. He read up on vegetables, orchards, cattle and fish before starting the farm about five years ago, and commercial vegetables now cover about 300 decimals.
Rotating high-value crops on one plot has driven his income. On 40 decimals he planted capsicum and naga chilli around January; heavy rain killed some plants, but capsicum still left a net profit of about Tk 150,000. In late May the plot went to local bottle gourd, costing Tk 40,000 and netting Tk 110,000. It now carries trellised cucumber, picked every two days and sold wholesale at Tk 25-35 a kilogram.
He has newly planted 50 decimals of banana mango and 30 decimals of Ball Sundari and apple jujube, and more than 2,000 local banana plants ring the farm. On a trial basis he keeps seven cattle, which give 10 to 12 litres of milk a day on average. Straw, rice bran and grass from the farm cover most of their feed, and a biogas plant supplies fuel and organic fertiliser.
For other growers he built an online platform, Agrosoma, selling seedling trays, cocopeat, shade net and sprayers along with biopesticides, neem oil, yellow sticky boards and pheromone traps. The report says the platform alone brings him Tk 40,000 to 50,000 a month in net income.
A training workshop at the Germplasm Centre in Bogura honoured him as a young entrepreneur. Munna said high interest on bank loans makes it hard for a farm to turn a profit. The reporter is KM Sakhawat Hossain in Netrokona.
Source: Nagorik TV
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