Trade in locally grown green malta is booming in Rangpur. Having profited from growing the fruit on small plots, farmers here are taking it up on a large scale, and malta orchards in the Rangpur region are increasing every year.

More than 200 maunds of malta are now sold at wholesale markets every day, worth about Tk 6.5 lakh. Malta is also sold directly from orchards, and that trade is worth a good deal too.

At City Bazar and more than 30 wholesale fruit shops around it, green malta is stacked among other local and foreign fruit. Such a sight was not seen even two years ago.

Md Rubel, owner of Rubel Fal Bhandar, said he sells about 60 maunds of green malta a day, claiming to sell the most of any wholesaler. Two years ago there was little demand for this malta and many buyers had to be pushed to take it, he said. He has been selling it since last Eid-ul-Azha, and local malta will be available for about another month.

Wholesalers at Rangpur City Bazar, including Tarequl Islam Milon and Bachchu Molla, said demand for local malta has grown because imported malta has become unusually expensive per kilogram. Prices are also better than last year, at Tk 70 to 90 a kg. For the first time this year, small traders are buying green malta on their own initiative and hawking it from neighbourhood to neighbourhood, as they do with mangoes.

According to the DAE Rangpur regional office, malta was grown on some demonstration plots in 2016 to encourage farmers in the region. Because it yields well and is profitable on little land, farmers' interest in it grew.

In the 2019–20 season, malta was grown on a total of 98.2 hectares in the region: 50 hectares in Rangpur district, 3 in Gaibandha, 9 in Kurigram, 22 in Lalmonirhat and 14.2 in Nilphamari.

In the airport area of Lalmonirhat district, Md Ekramul has built a large orchard of 2,800 malta trees on 6 acres. He got a small crop in 2020, and this season he expects 2,000 maunds if no natural disaster strikes. He said harvesting formally began on 22 September with 80 maunds picked, and he has sold malta at Tk 90 a kg.

Farmer Abdur Rahim Basunia of Charaikhola union in Nilphamari Sadar upazila said he planted 70 cutting saplings of the BARI Malta-1 variety on 20 decimals of land in May 2017. Forty were supplied free by the agriculture office and he bought the other 30 at Tk 100 each. He got his first 60 kg in 2019, 16 maunds in 2020 and about 25 maunds this season. He sold malta at Tk 80 a kg this year. The same 20 decimals used to grow only one potato crop a year, and he considers malta economically profitable. Following his example, many in Charaikhola union have started growing it, he said.

Within the region, malta farming has expanded markedly in Rangpur district. Tree lover Mamunur Rashid of Parghat village in Baldipukur mauza, Ranipukur union, Mithapukur upazila, has had great success. He planted 112 malta trees on a 1.5-acre orchard in 2016 and has harvested four times so far. He used to grow various crops but switched to malta because it pays more.

Md Mahbubar Rahman, deputy director at the DAE Rangpur regional office, said farmers have been encouraged since 2016 through various projects to grow more fruit, to fill the region's shortfall of nutritious food and make it easy to obtain. Because farmers are profiting from malta, the area under the fruit grows every year, he said.

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