Flood Tolerant Paddy Varieties See Success
Kurigram farmers get hopes up
Farmer Beauty Begum, middle, along with other farmers of Sobandaho village under Kurigram Sadar upazila poses for camera, standing in their paddy field where they cultivated flood tolerant variety BRRI-51. Photo: Star File
Cultivation of flood resilient paddy varieties including BRRI-51, BRRI-52, IRRI-64 and Samba-masuri has brought new hope to the farmers in flood-prone areas of the district. Because of flood and heavy rain, farmers in nine upazilas could not harvest paddy properly in the previous years. But last season, they had a bumper production of Aman. With the flood tolerant varieties, some 700 hectares of land were brought under cultivation in the district, said Md Saiduur Rahman, an agriculturist at Solidarity, a local NGO working to popularise cultivation of the aforesaid varieties of paddy. “These paddy varieties have brought an opportunity for expanding the arable lands as the low lying areas are yet to be used for Aman cultivation.” “Because of high yield, farmers are now showing interest to cultivate the land with the flood tolerant varieties of paddy”, he added. According to Department of Agriculture Extension (DAE) sources, at least 1, 21,462 hectares of land were brought under Aman cultivation of different varieties in the district in last season. Of the cultivated land, 93,425 hectares were chosen for high yielding varieties of Aman, 27,374 hectares for local varieties and 663 hectares for hybrid varieties. Upazila Agriculture Officer of Kurigram Sadar Md Maznur Rahman said about 60 hectares of land in the district were brought under cultivation with the flood resilient varieties including BRRI-51 and BRRI-52. Abdus Sabur, a farmer of Baldia union in Bhurungamari upazila said, “The new variety grew well in the field although the area was not affected by flood last season". “At least 17 farmers in the union have cultivated the BRRI-51 variety,” he added. Expressing his joy, Abul Hossain Master, a farmer of Bhitarbanda union in Nageswari upazila, said he had collected two kilograms of seed of BRRI-52 variety from Solidarity.” “Though the saplings were under water more than 18 days, I received a good production on my 30 decimals of land.” Beauty Begum, a farmer of Sobandaho village in Ghogadaho union of Sadar upazila, also national award winner for farming, cultivated the BRRI-51 variety on three decimals of land in 2009. “Seeing a good production, I had cultivated the variety in six bighas of land. Saplings of the variety were under water for only three days in last season. I got a bumper production of the paddy this year too”.
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