Rangamati is known across Bangladesh for its juicy pineapples, but in a glut farmers cannot get a fair price. To turn the perishable fruit into chips, a fruit processing demonstration centre and chips factory was built for about Tk 40 lakh at the Naniarchar horticulture centre. It was opened in June 2021 and closed soon after, without ever starting commercial production.
It was set up by the agriculture ministry and the Department of Agricultural Extension (DAE) under a project on improving nutrition through year-round fruit production. According to the planning ministry's Implementation Monitoring and Evaluation Division (IMED), it was part of a Tk 299.23 crore project carried out at 66 horticulture centres in 48 districts. Officials say a lack of skilled staff and technical support kept production from starting.
On a recent visit the centre was padlocked. Inside, the machinery was coated in dust, electrical wiring was coming loose and rain was leaking through holes in the roof.
Farmers say wholesalers buy the large pineapples but not the small and medium ones, which are left to rot beside the road. Naniarchar grower Md Hanif said a working factory would at least stop that waste. Another grower, Mohammad Alamgir, said it would let farmers sell the leftover fruit and give jobs to unemployed young people.
Md Mahbubur Rashid, deputy director of the Banarupa horticulture centre in Rangamati, said the centre ran temporarily under the project around 2021-22 and some staff were trained, but it could not pay its own way. Efforts are under way to restart it through a public-private partnership, a private entrepreneur or the revenue budget, he said. DAE Rangamati deputy director Md Moniruzzaman also said steps would soon be taken to reopen it.
The report is by Mikel Chakma of Prothom Alo.
Photo: Fyaj Khan Anam / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Source: Prothom Alo
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