Timber trader finds fortune in dragon fruit farming
Surat Ali, a middle-aged farmer based in Khulna's Jhenaidah district, is enjoying massive success from dragon fruit cultivation.
Proclaiming himself to be the biggest dragon fruit farmer in the country's Southwestern region, Ali was previously engaged in the timber trade.
During a visit to his farm in Shibnagar village on Saturday afternoon, this correspondent found that dragon fruits were being cultivated on a vast expanse of land.
Ali told The Daily Star that his timber trade had ended badly in 2015 but while working on his plot one day, he saw that some guava plants had taken root nearby. He then planted the fruit and after eight months, enjoyed a handsome profit from his produce.
This allured Ali to the idea of dragon fruit farming while Rostom Ali, his nephew who served at the agriculture research institute in Jashore at the time, encouraged him as well.
He now cultivates the Vietnamese Lal variety, which is very attractive and delicious.
Ali began farming dragon fruit on three bighas of land in 2017. He then sold the harvested crop in August 2018 for about Tk 12 lakh.
By 2019, he had expanded the cultivation area to 15 bighas and sold the fruits produced for Tk 30 lakh in total while he also sold around Tk 10 lakh worth of seedlings.
In 2020, he expanded his farm again to 20 bighas, earning him about Tk 40 lakh worth of dragon fruit and Tk 25 lakh worth of seedlings.
This year, he cultivated dragon fruit on 30 bighas of land and had already sold Tk 60 lakh worth of fruits and Tk 30 lakh worth of seedlings as of September 20.
He expects to be able to sell another Tk 20 to Tk 25 lakh of dragon fruits up till December.
Ali had purchased the extra land in 2020 for about Tk 50 lakh. About 10 workers are employed by the farm.
Each dragon fruit plant lasts about 20 to 25 years at a stretch.
The plants start flowering from April each year and within 30 to 35 days, the harvesting begins.
The harvesting period lasts for around six months with four plants producing 25 to 30 kilogrammes of fruit collectively. Each kilogramme is sold for between Tk 200 to Tk 250.
Now, people from different areas of the district flock to the farm to have a look at its dragon fruit plots.
One such visitor, Fazlur Rahman of Kaliganj upazila. said he was astonished by the vast cultivation of dragon fruit.
Jahangir Hossain, a dragon fruit trader based in Dhaka, said he purchases the fruit from Ali as the quality of his produce is very rich.
"We purchase each maund (37 kilogrammes) for Tk 10,000," he added.
Fellow traders Selim Hossain and Raihan Mia echoed the same.
Dr Md Ashrafuzzaman Zahid Hossain, chairman of the department of Nutrition and Food Technology at the Jashore Science and Technology University, said the Lal variety of dragon fruit is rich in antioxidants like flavonoids, phenolic acid and betacyanin.
It is naturally fat free and high in fibre as well, and may even help lower blood sugar.
Asgar Ali, deputy director of the Department of Agricultural Extension in Jhenaidah, said Ali earns more than Tk one crore a year by selling dragon fruits grown on his vast plots.
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