Incessant rainfall affects 370 hectare land’s crop in Rajshahi
BSS, Rajshahi :
Standing crops on around 369.52 hectares of land have reportedly been affected by inundation caused by the recent huge downpour in the district.
The latest primary data given by the local office of the Department of Agricultural Extension (DAE) showed there are transplanted aman paddy on 83,177 hectares, vegetables on 5,449 hectares, black gram on 4,132 hectares and summer onion on 140 hectares of land in the district at present.
Among those, around 369.53 hectare land’s standing crops were inundated by the rainwater.
Suman Ali, 43, a farmer of on three bigha of land in two separate places with the hopes of good profit. Ali said his hopes and aspirations were vanished by the monsoon.
DAE Deputy Director Mozder Hossain said the highest 128 hectares were inundated in Paba Upazila followed by 122 hectares in Bagha Upazila, 46 hectares in Tanore, 36.52 hectares in Charghat, 30 hectares in Godagari and seven hectares in Mohanpur Upazilas.
He, however, said an actual picture of the extent of losses will be available after receding water.
Local office of the Department of Meteorology has recorded 332 millimeters rainfall from 10 pm on Wednesday to 6 am on Friday.
The met office sources said the rainfall has broken the last ten years record in the region.
With the standing crops, many fish farming ponds were overflowed by the rain water affecting the fish farmers badly.
Mridul Islam, 48, a farmer of Tanore Upazila, said his fish farming ponds on 30 bigha of land were overflowed by the deluge.
He had fish worth around Taka 40 lakh in the ponds and all of those were washed out.
Prof Chowdhury Sarwar Jahan of the Department of Geology and Mining at Rajshahi University said the unplanned and illegal excavation of ponds and development of housing plots are escalating public sufferings.
Extent of public suffering will go up in the years to come if necessary measures aren’t taken in this regard immediately, he said.
All the field level entities concerned including administration should come forward and work together to mitigate the problem as early as possible, he opined.
Staff Reporter from Kishoreganj adds: The continuous heavy rain of last week has flooded six thousand six hundrads forty one ponds and fisheries worth about Tk 40 crore were washed away.
About 3600 fish farmers of Kishoreganj have faced severe losses.
About Tk 43 crore have been damaged including infrastructure and fish.
Among the drifted fish there are various species of fish including shing, pabda, rui and pangas.
District Fisheries Officer (DFO) in Kishoreganj, Mohammad Shahidul Islam confirmed this information.
According to the District Fisheries Office, a total of 6,641 ponds and fisheries of 3,500 fish farmers have sunk in the district. About 18,500 tons of fish were washed away. Its market value is 37 crore six lakh 35 thousand taka.
Apart from this, the infrastructure of the pond and fishery has been damaged to the tune of 6 crore rupees.
It is estimated that the damage to infrastructure and fish is around Tk 43 crore.
Among these, the most damage has been done in Katiadi and Kishoreganj Sadar Upazilas of the district. One thousand 925 pond fishes were washed away in Katiyadi upazila.
A fish farmer named Saki said, two of my fisheries have drowned in one night’s rain. The water is going over the bank. Each fishery had fish worth three to four lakh rupees.
Another farmer named Amin Sadi said, I had a fishery of 25 percent. During the night rain, the fishes washed away the banks of the fishery. About 50 thousand rupees have been damaged.
He also said that our former chairman Mansoor Ali had a big fisery of 36 plots of land, including this, everything has gone down. In addition, all fisheries in the area have sunk.
Marginal fish farmers like us have suffered the most. If the government provides incentives, then maybe I can stand a little.
