Home ›› 13 Dec 2022 ›› Front
Bangladesh produced 14 flowers for each citizen on average in the last financial year. However, the majority of the production remained stuck in just five districts and farmers produced mostly five flowers only.
Compared to 234.42 crore pieces of different flowers grown in FY2020-21, production increased slightly in FY2021-22 by 1.4 crores to 235.82 crores, according to latest the Department of Agricultural Extension (DAE) data.
It said farmers grew the flowers on 2,424.33 hectares of land across the country in FY22. DAE records the data on the cultivation of 17 types of flowers.
In FY2017-18, farmers produced more than 19 flowers for each citizen on average. Since then, production has gone down by 27 per cent in five years.
In FY18, farmers around the country produced 320.91 crore pieces of flowers, 282.45 crores in FY2018-19, and 252.40 crores in FY2019-20.
“Production was reduced mainly due to weather conditions. The Covid-19 pandemic also had some impacts,” Md Rezual Karim, additional director (horticulture) of DAE, told The Business Post.
The country imported over 1.20 lakh pieces of different flowers in FY22.
The five flowers
DAE data showed that the country produced 141.56 crore pieces of marigold (Gada) — the highest — in FY22, followed by 63.48 crore roses, 11.27 crore tuberoses (Rajanigandha), 7.67 crore gerberas, and 6.85 crore pieces of gladiolus.
The total production of these five flowers stood at 230.83 crore, which is around 98 per cent of the total.
In FY21, some 212 crore pieces of flowers were of these top five varieties, which was 90.44 per cent of the total.
Jhenaidah on top
Meanwhile, Jhenaidah came on top among the districts by producing the highest — 140.86 crore — number of flowers in FY22. This district mostly produces marigolds and has adequate infrastructure for flower farming, processing and marketing.
Md Asgar Ali, the deputy director of DAE Jhenaidah, said, “We have built a high-quality processing zone for the farmers where they can store, process and pack their flowers before selling them to the buyers at a marketplace that we have also established.”
“Farmers are expanding flower cultivation and many have started flower farming due to these developed infrastructures,” he added.
Jhenaidah was followed by Dhaka with 45.95 crores, Jashore with 37.20 crores, Chuadanga with 2.41 crores, and Chattogram with 1.81 crores, showed the DAE data.
These five districts together produced 228.23 crore pieces of flower, which is around 97 per cent of the total production in FY22.
Infrastructure, diversification
DAE officials said concentrating production in limited areas and setting up marketing hubs in those areas are parts of a good business model that can give the sector the necessary boost.
“Buyers don’t want to move from one place to another to get the flowers they want. They want to buy all of them from one place and then transport them without much hassle,” said Ahsanul Hoque Chowdhury, an additional deputy director (fruit and flower) at DAE’s Horticulture Wing.
He said DAE has the plan to diversify the flower varieties. “We are working on it.”
On the issue of diversification, Asgar said, “A group of Dutch businessmen and officials from the Netherlands embassy visited Jhenaidah recently. They talked to us about growing tulips here.
“They said it’s possible to cultivate tulips in this district but sheds will be needed to control the temperature. Winter is suitable and after winter, the temperatures of those sheds will have to be kept within 18-20 degrees Celsius.”
“We are working on it since foreign investors are interested,” he added.
However, Jamir Uddin, a farmer from Jhenaidah Sadar, said, “The production has not been good in the past several years. But the DAE officials have been regularly giving us advice on farming and how to boost production.”
He said, “The breeding and seed production facilities in the country are not good enough. We are still heavily dependent on India for the seeds and seedlings of marigolds, chrysanthemums (Chandramallika) and gerberas. Production from the imported ones is always higher than the local ones.”
He added that farmers want to increase production as the demand is high but they lack the capital or investment to expand.