WATER SCARCITY
Jute growers fear huge losses
Jute growers are apprehending huge losses in the current fiscal year as they have been facing severe problems in rotting green jute due to shortage of water in many districts.
Farmers and officials concerned said less rainfall, drying up of water bodies and shortage of upstream water in the north-eastern zones escalated the problems.Although jute plants had been being cut off for the last couple of weeks, they were still kept on lands and getting dried because they could not be moved to a place for decomposition for shortage of water, according to farmers in Bajitpur and Karimganj upazilas of Kishoreganj district.
Talking to New Age, jute growers in Kishoreganj, Jheniadah and some parts of Kurigram district expressed their fear of incurring big losses.
According to the Department of Agriculture Extension, jute was cultivated on 7.41 lakh hectares of land in the 2013-2014 fiscal year. Local varieties of jute were grown on 51,277 hectares while tusa on 6,52,252 hectares, kenaf on 19,548 hectares and mesta on 18,222 hectares.
Total jute production has been estimated at 76.10 lakh bales during the last fiscal 2012-13, said an official record of Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics.
Bangladesh Krishak Samity general secretary Sajjad Zahir Chandan told New Age that the government should immediately take measures to implement crop-insurance to save the farmers.
The farmers would have to incur great losses as they would not be able to harvest quality jutes due to severe water crisis, he said.
New Age Kurigram correspondent reported that the drought-like situation had been prevailing in the district’s Nagersuri, Buringamari, Kurigram sadar and Rajarhat upazilas where farmers were facing problems in rotting the jutes due to shortage of rainwater.
They were scared to cut jute stalks as they would not be able to decompose them for lack of water bodies, he added.
While New Age Jhenidah correspondent added that farmers in the district had also been facing the crisis as the water bodies were drying up.
Rabiul Islam, a farmer of Shailakupa upazilas, said they used to rot green jute in the river Kumar, but its water had been polluted of late as some farmers had stacked their green jute in the river.
Amulya Kumar Mandal, a farmer of Jhenaidah sadar upazilas, said the local water bodies had been dried up due to lack of rainfall.
Jhenidah sadar upazila agriculture officer Abdul Mazid Joarder said usually 2,500 millimetres of rainfall is required for jute rotten purposes in June-August period every year, but during the last six months it was a paltry 5,000 millimetres, said the UAO.
DAE deputy director Joynul Abedin confirmed that severe water crisis was the reason behind the problem.
Agriculturists at the DAE suggested the farmers should use ribbon retting technology to rot jute plants when there is scarcity of water to reap fibres of better quality and increased production.
They also asked the farmers to contact with the local agriculture officers to learn about the latest technology.
-With New Age input
