Crops worth Tk 105cr damaged

With the receding of floodwater in the Teesta, Brahmaputra and Dharala basins in five northern districts of Rangpur region, crops on thousands of hectares of land have been damaged.

Khondokar Mesbahul Islam, horticulture specialist in the regional office of the Department of Agriculture Extension (DAE) in Rangpur, said flood damaged crops on 13.5 thousand hectares of land in 22 upazilas of five northern districts -- Rangpur, Gaibandha, Nilphamari, Kurigram and Lalmonirhat.

Of them, 6,703 hectares are of aman paddy fields, 4,070 hectares of seedbeds, 1,613 hectares of vegetables, 1,098 hectares of jute and four hectares of bananas, he said.

Total value of damaged crops is estimated to be Tk 105 crore, while 2.5 lakh farmers have been directly affected, Mesbahul added.

The worst affected upazilas are Gangachhara, Kaunia, Pirgachha of Rangpur; Sundarganj, Saghata, Sadar upazila and Fulchhari under Gaibandha; Ulipur, Chilmari, Roumari, Rajibpur, Bhurungamari, Nageswari, Fulbari and Rajarhat of Kurigram; and Hatibandha, Aditmari, Kaliganj, Patgram, and Sadar upazila of Lalmonirhat; and Dimla and Jaldhaka of Nilphamari.

GM Idris, deputy director of DAE in Nilphamari, said the flooding was widespread in the district as a 10-kilometre-long and 250-metre-wide new canal of the Teesta, with 35-40- foot depth, breached the left embankment and entered the locality.

It devoured 2,200 acres of croplands and made about 3,000 people homeless only in Dimla upazila, he added.

Farmer Monnaf Ali, 60, of Char Kharibari village in Dimla, who has taken shelter on the flood control embankment of WDB at Dalia village, said he cultivated paddy on 12 bighas of land and jute on three bighas, but the Teesta devoured everything, making him a beggar overnight.

In Nohali village under Gangachhara upazila, farmers said they wanted to re-transplant aman paddy as flood water receded, but found no seedlings in the surrounding area.

Farmers in different villages of Nilphamari and Rangpur are likely to transplant late variety of paddy to make up their losses to some extent, and they badly need government assistance, which is still not available.

Md Shah Alam, additional director (AD) of regional DAE, said they were trying to arrange late variety paddy seedlings like BRRI-dhan-51 and BRRI-dhan-52 from nearby flood-free upazilas. At the same time, they would provide farmers with all sorts of support.

He said they encouraged the farmers to sow seeds of wheat, potato, mustard and mung bean in advance in fallow lands.

The regional DAE had set a target to cultivate aman paddy on 5.22 lakh hectares of land to produce 14.5-lakh tonnes of rice. But damage to vast tracts of paddy fields by flood dealt a big blow to achieving the target, though the AD says there will be expected yield.