Record maize output likely in Rangpur region

BSS, Rangpur :
An all-time record output of maize is expected in Rangpur agriculture region where harvest of the crop has just begun with excellent yield rate during the current Rabi season.
 Officials of the Department of Agricultural Extension (DAE) said the farmers are expecting a record production of maize after exceeding the fixed farming target of the cash crop by 5.12 percent this season.
 Market sources said, the farmers are happy to sell their newly harvested maize at rates between Taka 1,050 and Taka 1,100 per mound (every 40-kg) with a hope of getting its higher market price with the progress of harvest this season.
 Earlier, the DAE had fixed a target of producing 11,70,696 tonnes of maize from 1,08,065 hectares of land for all five districts of Rangpur, Gaibandha, Kurigram, Nilphamari and Lalmonirhat in the region this season.
“However, the farmers finally brought 1,13,600 hectares of land under its cultivation, exceeding the fixed farming target by 5,535 hectares of land or 5.12 percent,” Additional Director of the DAE for Rangpur region Agriculturist Md. Aftab Hossain said.
 Till Saturday, farmers completed harvesting of maize on 7,772 hectares of land, 6.84 percent of the total cultivated land area, producing 83,216 tonnes of the cereal crop in the region.
 The average yield rate of maize currently stands at 10.71 tonnes per hectare of land in the region where the total production might be around 1.21-lakh tonnes after completion of harvest this season if the climatic conditions remain favorable.
 “Continuously growing demand of maize in the poultry, dairy, animal husbandry and food industry sectors along with its repeated bumper production and lucrative market price is inspiring famers to further expand its cultivation,” Hossain said.
 The government provided special incentives in terms of high yielding varieties of maize seeds and fertilizers and latest technologies to small, marginal and flood-hit farmers to enhance maize cultivation this season in the region.
Talking to BSS, farmers Farhad Hossain, Ahmmed Ali and Abul Kalam of different villages in Rangpur said they have just started harvesting of maize and selling the produce at rates between Taka 1,000 and 1,100 per mound to reap excellent profits.
 Shahinur Islam and his wife Fancy Begum of Char Purbo Mohipur of Gangachara upazila in Rangpur said they have cultivated maize with other crops like pumpkin, ‘Khira’, potato and green chilli on two acres of the dried-up beds of the river Teesta.