High-yield Aman variety proves successful

Farmers participating in a test cultivation of BRRI-87, a variety of Aman rice, in Baniary village under Nazirpur upazila, are delighted after reaping more than double the harvest than the local variety.

The BRRI-87 variety was cultivated around four months back on three acres of land in the village where 16 farmers took part for the first time, said Bijan Krishna Howlader, sub-assistant agriculture officer in the upazila.

About a week ago, approximately 52 maunds (one maund is equal to 37.3242 kilograms) of BRRI-87 paddy was harvested from each acre of the land, he said, adding that the local variety usually yields 25 maunds of paddy from the same size of a land.   

Farmer Ramendranath Roy, who cultivated the BRRI-87 variety on one bigha (33 decimals) of land, said he never got more than 10 maunds of local variety of paddy from each bigha of land.

But this time, after cultivating the BRRI-87, he has gotten over 20 maunds of paddy from the same land, he added.

Another advantage of the BRRI-87 over the local variety is that its irrigation cost is less as it is planted during the monsoon and it matures for harvest in only about four months -- at least one month earlier than the local variety.

This also allows farmers sufficient time to cultivate winter crops on the same land.

Considering the high yield and shorter harvest time, the overall cost of cultivation of BRRI-87 is relatively low, said the farmers.

"Normally we spend around Tk 5,500 to cultivate the local variety whereas an additional Tk 1,000 is needed to cultivate the BRRI- 87 variety," said Projesh Kumar Mondal, another farmer from the same village.

Besides, farmers can cultivate winter crops after harvesting it and there is not much additional cost involved, he also said. "As the paddy grows during the rainy season, we don't need to spend money for irrigation."

"We will prepare the land for cultivating Robi crops after harvesting BRRI-87, but the farmers growing the local variety will need to wait almost another month to harvest their paddy," said farmer Ananda Roy.

Sub-Assistant Agriculture Officer Bijan Krishna said BRRI-87 has a maximum lifespan of 130 days as opposed to the local Aman variety, which has 160 days of lifespan.

Farmers are quite happy with the high yield after growing BRRI-87 for the first time in Pirojpur and it will be cultivated in a larger area next year, he added.