The markets of Rangamati, the town of lakes and hills, are flooded with seasonal watermelons, better known as 'Maini watermelons'. Seasonal fruit traders are selling them in every market in town: Banarupa, College Gate, Reserve Bazar and Tabalchhari.

Mainimukh Bazar grew up at the confluence of the Maini and Kachalong rivers in Longadu upazila. A wholesale market for locally grown watermelons sits there every Saturday, and most of the watermelons sold in the district town come from it. Besides Mainimukh, all watermelons grown on land that rises from Kaptai Lake's waters are now popularly known as 'Maini watermelons'.

There has been a bumper watermelon harvest this year in the hill areas of Rangamati, especially along the banks of Kaptai Lake and in the Chengi river basin. After meeting local demand, the juicy, sweet fruit is going to Dhaka, Chattogram and other parts of the country, giving farmers good profits. Farmers are gaining from good yields at low cost in favourable weather.

Several seasonal traders sit in rows on the footpath in Banarupa, Rangamati town. They said they sell all their watermelons as 'Maini watermelons', although farmers also bring watermelons from Subalong, Barkal and Naniarchar in the district to Samataghat, Rangamati's wholesale seasonal fruit market.

Trader Sohel Chakma said: "I have sold watermelons and pineapples alongside vegetables for twenty years. Early in the season there is more local watermelon in the market, so watermelons grown here, especially Maini watermelons, are more popular and in more demand. We buy wholesale at Samataghat and sell on the footpath. Prices are quite high this time. I had to buy wholesale at Tk 180 a piece, and then there is transport and labour, so each watermelon costs Tk 200 on average. Then the small ones have to be sold for under Tk 100, and the big ones for Tk 400 at most."

Seasonal traders Md Zafar and Belal Hossain said: "Here all watermelons are sold as 'Maini watermelons', though watermelons come to the market from other areas too. We bring ours directly from Maini. A hundred watermelons cost us nearly Tk 20,000. Then 5-6 spoil every day. If 20-25 out of a hundred are large, the rest are mostly medium and small. We have to sell with a lot of calculation."

Belal Hossain said: "I used to farm myself. Farming does not make you much money, so I started trading two years ago. Prices were good at the start of the season; I sold big watermelons for Tk 600-700. Now I am selling for Tk 450 at most."

After finishing their HSC exams, two friends from Dhaka, Tahmid and Sakib, came to visit a friend in Rangamati and became interested in the seasonal fruit trade. For the past month they have been taking pineapples and jackfruit from Rangamati to fruit wholesalers in Dhaka. They said they made a good profit on pineapples but lost money on jackfruit. They are now selling watermelons retail on the footpath in Rangamati and also sending them regularly to Dhaka wholesalers.

Tahmid and Sakib told Jagonews: "The seasonal fruit trade is very hard. Prices go up and down constantly, and profit or loss depends on nature. If it rains, demand for watermelons will fall to zero. There is also a lot of fraud in this sector: dishonest traders use carbide to ripen bananas, hormones on pineapples and artificial colour in watermelons. We want to break down this wall of deception. We want people in Dhaka to be able to eat Rangamati's chemical-free seasonal fruit safely."

According to the Department of Agricultural Extension (DAE) in Rangamati, about 7,200 tonnes of watermelon are expected to be produced this year.

Md Moniruzzaman, deputy director of DAE in Rangamati, said the good weather this year had given a good watermelon yield. Watermelons have already started reaching the market. This year farmers grew some early varieties, and they are getting good prices for them, he said.

Source: Jagonews24. First published in Bengali on The Agro News.