Agriculture revolutionised in northern chars

Sixty-five-year-old Ghetu Mondal, who spent his entire life in traditional farming, got a surprise when he became able to double his crop yield with new varieties of seeds and some changes in the cultivation method.

The Gaibandha farmer can now produce 30 to 35 maunds of maize on a bigha of land from where he used to get 15 maunds earlier.

"Not only maize but also paddy, cucumber, chilli, ladies finger and many other items have now been cultivated widely in char land. The situation, however, was completely different a few years ago," Ghetu Mondal said while talking to The Business Standard recently.

"In the past, we were not aware of high-yield seeds and effective use of fertiliser and pesticide. Rather, we used to depend on retailers' advice. Now, we are trained and we can identify the best ones on our own," he added and expressed his gratitude towards a development project that helped them make revolutionary progress.

Mondal is one of the over 1,30,000 beneficiaries of the joint initiative of the Switzerland and Bangladesh governments, titled "Making markets Work for the Jamuna, Padma Teesta chars", which commenced in 2012 covering chars of six districts – Shariatpur, Gaibandha, Rangpur, Kurigram, Lalmonirhat and Jamalpur.

Non-profit organisation Swisscontact and Bogura-based Rural Development Academy are implementing the project, scheduled to expire in 2024, with an allocation of nearly Tk60 crore.  

The project aims to make private and public actors realise the potential of char areas so that they invest in the regions as well as provide necessary services.

The farmers have been trained on modern technologies for farming crops and cattle and many others have been provided assistance to grow as entrepreneurs under the project. It also helped farmers be connected directly with different giant companies such as Aftab, ACI and Nourish for selling their products – a new way of marketing.

According to the Academy, the overall agricultural production in the char areas has increased by 23% over the past eight years thanks to the tireless effort of stakeholders under the project. 

"Jute, Paddy, vegetables and other varieties of crops can now be grown on the sandy char land three times a year. Production has also seen a revolutionary increase," said Abdul Mazid Pramanik, director of the Making markets work for Jamuna, Padma Teesta Chars project. 

Training farmers on modern methods and supplying high-yield seeds are the key reasons behind the success, he, also joint director of the Rural Development Academy, told The Business Standard.

Beneficiaries also echoed the same. "The training helped us switch to modern cultivation systems, new varieties of seeds, and new ways of marketing," said Lalmonirhat-based farmer Rafiqul Islam. 

Farmers also said that the project has brought an additional benefit to them – frequent visits of agriculture officers and experts to the char areas.

"Earlier, agriculture officers were reluctant to come to chars. Now, they are visiting us on a regular basis thanks to the stimulation of the new initiative. As a result, we now get proper suggestions about cultivation on time," said Gaibandha farmer Moksed Ali.

"Also, the entire system of cultivation, storage and marketing ways have been changed. Even, a change also came about in the way of drying up crops," he noted.

Department of Agricultural Extension Deputy Director for Lalmonirhat Md Hamidur Rahman said char land now produces better quality goods thanks to its fertile soil, given seeds and different government and non-government initiatives.

Modern equipment and microcredit available now

The project also helped make available modern agricultural equipment and loans for char area farmers.

The latest data says some 2092 farmers have been trained on the uses of modern equipment in 2022 and they bought equipment worth Tk6.8 crore.

Besides, 4,682 farmers got Tk6.82 crore in loans from different government and non-government organisations this year while 875 agricultural entrepreneurs received Tk11.63 crore.

In total, farmers received Tk48 crore in credit since the inception of the project.

Marketing to giant companies

The project also established 19 crop reservation and sale centres for the beneficiary farmers in its jurisdiction and promoted dozens of new business models. Besides, a number of 306 lobbyists, also known as TOS, have been appointed to help farmers sell their products to different giant companies.

In the ongoing calendar year, about 30,350 farmers sold their crops and animal products to the companies via the lobbyists, according to the project documents.

"We have been sourcing maize directly from farmers since 2017. As we have found maize produced in the chars is better in quality than that of mainland and import, we have reduced our maize import substantially," Aftab Group Director Kazi Sibbir Ahmed said during a visit to Gaibandha's Fulchari Char last year.

The conglomerate now buys more than 1 lakh tonnes of maize every year from the char farmers directly.

"Several large companies such as Square, Nourish, Paragon and ACI are now sourcing agricultural goods directly from us while many others are contacting us to do so," said Gaibandha farmer Komor Uddin, who supplies maize to Kazi Feed Mills.

Entrepreneurship also in focus

The joint initiative of Bangladesh and Switzerland governments has so far trained at least 4,000 people of the chars to help them grow as entrepreneurs, project officials said. Many of them are now involved in the nursery business, artificial insemination of animals and some other fields beyond agriculture.

"After getting training under the project, I started a business of cattle artificial insemination materials, particularly semen of foreign cows.  It turned my life around," said Sultan Hossain.

"When I started, people were not aware of the products, now they are being sold like hotcakes. Every month I sell about 300 doses of foreign cow semen," he added and noted that he recently appointed several employees in his growing business.

The project documents said it helped every beneficiary household make Tk13,000 in additional earnings per month on average.