A passion for Palmyra palms

In much of the country, a village is hardly a village without the Palmyra palm. Locally known as a tal tree, the native species is renowned for sweet, gelatinous fruit and for jaggery made from its sap. The palm is also well-regarded as a natural lightning rod, preventing thunderstorm deaths. Yet for Md Rafiqul Islam, 63, from Lonjair village in Mymensingh's Gafargaon upazila, its prime attraction is the heritage value. Over the last twenty years he has planted thousands of the palms to ensure its continued presence as a landscape favourite.

“Back in 1997 I noticed the palms were become rare,” says Rafiq. “Economically struggling villagers were selling the trees for around Tk 5000 each and nobody was planting new palms, which need to grow for up to two decades before they bear fruit.”

“Of my own accord I planted 3,000 saplings at first,” he continues, “along both sides of a two-kilometre stretch of village road. But in the year 2000 most were destroyed during road-widening works, so I had to plant more. Fortunately, the then-parliamentarian, the late Altaf Hossain Golandaj, encouraged me.”

Since then, Rafiq has planted Palmyra palm saplings every year. “I never took any financial support for my tree-planting,” he says. “I hire labourers to tend them.”

In 1972, Rafiq achieved his intermediate graduation at Dhaka's Titumir College where he was also the founding secretary of the college chapter of Chhatra League. After Bangabandhu's killing he successfully claimed political asylum in Germany, returning in the 1990s. For his work planting Palmyra palms, in 2017 he received the Bangabandhu National Award for Agriculture.

Rafiq credits the Local Government Engineering Department for supporting his endeavours. “The roads belong to the department,” he says. “They agreed to a 25-year contract that allows me to plant the trees along the roadsides and secure forty percent of profits.”

Rafiq was subsequently enlisted to produce 1,000 palm saplings for a by-pass road in Tungipara of Gopalganj, with assistance provided by a technical team from the agriculture department.

Mohammad Ibrahim, who was once Gaffargaon's assistant land commissioner, is among Rafiq's most enthusiastic supporters. “Rafiq's passion for palms doesn't only benefit him,” he observes. “It brings very positive results for the whole community.”

Gaffargaon's current agriculture officer, SS Farhana Hossain, can only agree. “Palmyra palms are a great source of both fruit and wood,” she says. “They are important too, for biodiversity.”

“As a species, the Palmyra palm has value in providing shelter for many kinds of birds, especially weaver birds,” agro-forestry department professor at the Bangladesh Agricultural University, Dr GM Mujibar Rahman observes. “A number of bird species have reduced in number precisely because the Palmyra palm was becoming rare. In Bangladesh too, deaths caused by lightning strike is a significant hazard. Large, tall trees can save lives during thunderstorms, and the Palmyra palm is ideal.”

For Rafiq meanwhile, perhaps the greatest reward has been renewed community interest. “When the trees grew tall,” he says, smiling, “other villagers became inspired. They also started to plant them.” Thus it would seem that Rafiq hasn't only been planting trees. Simultaneously he has propagated a revived appreciation for that ubiquitous, attractive and useful village palm.