Home ›› 23 Nov 2022 ›› Nation
The Department of Agriculture Extension (DAE) has fixed a target of over 11, 70,696 tonnes of maize production from about 1, 08,065 hectares of land during this Rabi season in Rangpur division.
Officials of the DAE said farmers have already started sowing seeds of early varieties of maize on the same land after harvesting short duration Aman rice and riverine char areas as well.
Maize seeds have already been sowed in over 15,000 hectares of land till Monday last in all five districts of Rangpur, Gaibandha, Kurigram, Nilphamari and Lalmonirhat in the region where the sowing process continues.
Farmers are showing keen interest in farming maize on both mainland and riverine char areas after getting its repeated bumper productions with lucrative market prices in recent years as the crop has huge demand in local markets.
During the last Rabi season, farmers produced over 11.48-lakh tonnes of maize by cultivating the crop on 1, 06,217 hectares of land in the region.
“Besides, farmers produced 1.91 lakh tonnes of maize from 20,831 hectares of land during the just-ended Kharif-1 season,” said Additional Director of the DAE for Rangpur region Mohammad Shah Alam.
Like in the previous years, hundreds of char people are cultivating maize on the vast tracts of char lands and dried-up riverbeds of the Brahmaputra, Teesta, Dharla, Jamuna, Dudhkumar, Kartoa, Ghaghot, Atrai and other tributaries this season.
“The government is distributing special agriculture incentives in terms of seeds and fertilisers free of cost among small and marginal farmers to increase maize production this season like in the previous years to further increase its output,” Alam said.
