No more hike in fertiliser, seed prices: agri minister

The prices of fertiliser, seeds and other agricultural inputs will not be raised further to ensure continuous production and sustainable security of food, Agriculture Minister Muhammad Abdur Razzaque said today.

The government's policy is to increase food production at any cost and make food security sustainable, he said.

Therefore, the government will not increase the prices of agricultural inputs no matter how tough it becomes amid global economic recession, he said.

The minister was addressing the opening ceremony of the "International conference on food and nutrition security to achieve the sustainable development goals (SDGs) in SAARC countries", held at the Brac CDM Auditorium at Savar in Dhaka.

Agriculture will continue getting subsidies no matter whatever policies are adopted in future, Razzaque said.

Bangladesh Agricultural Extension Network (BAEN) and Participatory Rural Development Initiatives Society (PRDIS), a non-governmental organisation (NGO) in India, jointly organised the three-day conference.

For the first time in 11 years, the government raised the price of urea fertiliser by Tk 6 a kg to Tk 22 on August 1 last year.

Aman paddy yield was bumber this season, the minister said.

"A record amount of food is in stock. I can guarantee that there will be no famine in the country, Inshallah."

There is a huge gap between research and expansion of the crops, the minister said.

The variety developed by the local researchers or scientists produces eight maunds (37.32 kg) per bigha at the research stage, but the same variety could not produce over four maunds a bigha at the farmer level.

"Why is this happening? This huge gap should be reduced," he said.

Razzaque also said the developed varieties and technologies of various crops are very slowly expanding or reaching the farmers.

"Our scientists have recently developed several improved high-yielding varieties of many crops, including rice, and mustard. Among them are salt-tolerant varieties. But these are reaching the farmers very late in the field."

The officials of the Department of Agricultural Extension will have to find out what are the reasons behind it, he said adding that they should work with sincerity and dedication.

PRDIS Senior Advisor VV Sadamate, Special Representative of the Director-General at the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) Daniel Gustafson, FAO Bangladesh Representative Robert Simpson, BAEN President Hamidur Rahman and others spoke on the occasion.

About 350 delegates from India, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bhutan and Bangladesh participated in the three-day conference.