Emran Hossain
Prolonged submersion of agricultural land due to extreme weather such as intense rain and flooding have affected winter crop cultivation, leading to concerns that the crop production might plunge.
Losing crops to floods and heavy rain throughout monsoon, farmers could not sow winter crops in time for stagnation of water in agricultural land.
They fear that their winter crop production will fall too.
‘I went broke this year,’ said Ripon Rajbangshi, a farmer at Mirzapur in Tangail. Ripon sowed mustard half a month later than usual cultivation time as his land remained under water till December.
The water stagnation resulted from the flood that hit Tangail in July, Ripon said, adding that the flood halved his Aman production.
A Department of Agricultural Extension estimate shows that about 17 per cent of land demarcated for mustard cultivation this winter could not be tilled till December 27. Till the end of December 2017, mustard was sowed in 4.66 lakh hectares, down from 5.33 lakh hectares in 2016.
Cultivation of other major winter crops faced a similar situation, with the DAE struggling to achieve its cultivation target. The DAE fixes an area for cultivation of a particular crop based on past production record and hardly fails to achieve its target. But this time the overall situation does not seem favourable for cultivation.
The DAE estimate also shows that about 15 per cent of land demarcated for growing wheat this winter was lying uncultivated. Wheat could be cultivated in 2.90 lakh hectares against targeted area of 4 lakh hectares while in 2016 wheat was cultivated in 4.15 lakh hectares.
Onion cultivation achieved only 35 per cent of the target till December 27 with the crop growing in only 75,251 hectares against the target of 2.15 lakh hectares. Maize cultivation achieved a little over 67 per cent of the target while masur achieved 68.29 per cent and potato 91.50 per cent.
DAE field services wing director Abdul Hannan refused to make a comment about the matter saying that he would wait until the planting season was over as farmers were still planting winter crops.
Except for a few variations, the best time for sowing winter crops is between mid-October and mid-November, said Bangladesh Agricultural University agronomy professor Abdur Rahman Sarkar. ‘Delayed cultivation means low yield,’ said Rahman.
He cited a Bangladesh Agriculture Research Institute study to highlight the relation between production and timing of sowing. According to the study, Rahman said, sowing wheat later than December 5 means a loss of 44 kg in production per hectare per day.
Agro-businesspeople selling winter crop seeds have expressed disappointment over the drastic fall in their sales.
Ferdousi Begum, managing director of Ferdous Biotech, said that she had her entire collection of 40 tones potato seed unsold. She fears a loss of Tk 2 crore. ‘Farmer could not help the situation due to rain that led to widespread water-logging of agricultural land for months,’ said Ferdousi.
Ferdousi travelled six districts — Comilla, Nilphamari, Bogra, Thakurgaon and Dinajpur — in the first week of December and found vast areas of agricultural land under water. In the second week of December, met officials recorded an unusual spell of heavy rain.
In four days starting from December 8 the country experienced 1,951 mm rainfall whereas the average normal rainfall for the month is 10 mm. Water resource and climate change specialist Ainun Nishat said that rain in December, the beginning of winter, was highly unusual.
‘We are experiencing climate change impacts,’ said Nishat, professor emeritus at Centre for Climate Change and Environmental Research, BRAC University.
The government should have thought out a way for draining water out of agricultural land, but it failed to assess the situation despite repeated warning from experts, he added.
Experts have warned about extreme weather events continuing as untimely rain caused two early flash floods in the country’s north-eastern haor region in March and April, destroying Boro crops in 4 lakh hectares and eventually forcing the government to import rice first time in six years. Many of the haors are still waterlogged.
Intense rainfall caused two more floods during monsoon, inundating more than a third of the country, causing concerns among climate change experts that the country was facing climate change impacts which might endanger food security.
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in its 2014 report said that increased frequency of flooding, heat stress and draught would reduce crop yields by affecting the cultivation time. A 2016 study in The Lancet revealed that global emissions, climate change could cut the projected improvement in food availability by about a third by 2050.
Climate expert Nishat said that the December rain was a sign that climate experts were not wrong in their apprehension. December is the month of Agrahayan on Bangla calendar, said Nishat, drawing on a proverb describing the relation between untimely rain and production fall.
‘Rain in Agrahayan sends the king begging,’ goes the proverb.
- Courtesy: New Age/Jan 16, 2018
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