Innovative farmer's hydroponic tomato sees success

Dear readers, a few days back I went to Dohar's Northern Joypara, located very near to capital Dhaka. I would like to talk about hydroponic farming system that has been increasingly growing in our country as a new approach to farming solutions. One of my articles was recently published in The Daily Star regarding hydroponics. In the developed countries, hydroponic agriculture is happening for a long time. An entrepreneur from Dohar, Mizanur Rahman, is mainly a textile businessman. He has got involved with farming. It's also great that relentless campaign of Hridoye Mati O Manush has inspired many businessmen to come forward towards farming and invest in this sector with new methods and innovative ideas. 

Mizanur does his farming under a shed. Many refer to it as greenhouse where we see controlled temperature for the crops inside. He is cultivating tomatoes here with the technical help of local agriculture department and Agriculture Research Institute.

Already, you have seen a couple of examples of greenhouses based on modern technology in this show. Modern farming is basically turning this way. There is no use of soil in the first place. In Tin Dokan area of Dohar, on 3000 square feet, stands the farming field. Entrepreneurs say it is experimental. They plan to utilize these experiences for extending the farming in much broader areas.

The height of the greenhouse is 100 feet and the width is 30 feet, where they started off with 2000 tomato plants. Dear readers, I have already shown you earlier the local and foreign greenhouses. But, this one is more cost effective and easier to do. In that sense, it cannot totally be called a greenhouse. It is called a natural net house. Polyethylene is used to control the heat. It is not 100 percent controlled. In Europe, USA and Middle East countries, it is totally controlled.

The inspiring thing is that the size and production of tomatoes in this production system is very encouraging.

The trees were planted on the same day, Mizanur said.

They are getting five tomatoes from one bunch. This net house is also providing nutrient solutions to the plant accordingly which you have read in one of my articles published in The Daily Star.

These people are using locally made plastic boxes with holes under it so that the nutrients can easily enter the plants. And, they are planted over coco pit.   

The entrepreneur, Mizanur Rahman, has become very optimistic already. He is saying after calculating space, investment and time, this is a very profitable initiative he took. They are in the mission of cutting the production costs as initially they had spent quite a lot. Most of their investments went behind nutrients. And the cost so far has been 6.5 lakh taka, however if the project goes successful they would be able to earn approximately 13.5 lakh taka. 

They have seedbeds where they grow the seeds. Then they shift the seedlings to another place, to be grown with the assistance of nutrients. The whole system is organic and because of the nets no pests can enter the net house. What is encouraging is that we are getting to see such works in Bangladesh now. It is a perfect bondage between technology and entrepreneurs. Mizanur is very much grateful to the Hridoye Mati O Manush campaign on advanced farming and he has followed every step of the broadcast. People living in the surroundings are keenly watching the progress of this net house modern technology. Some are interested to do this in future.

Dear readers, farming is going to the hands of large scale entrepreneurs and investors. Keeping that in mind, the policymakers should think about how these new inventions can also help the ordinary farmers. Ultramodern technologies are great for farming advancement, but we must not forget the cause of the general farmers of our country. Through this, commercial excellence of agriculture will rise along with production and quality, but farmers' stake should be evaluated. Tomorrow's agriculture means poison-free, pure and high yielding agriculture. Since net housing can increase productivity with almost no use of pesticides, small farmers can also make cash crops here under protected cultivation system. But, to end this, I would again say, they need the effective support for this and when these farmers will come up with ventures like these, Bangladesh will see the holistic development in the farming sector.