Farmers' database in the making

Farmers plant green shoots in a paddy field. The government is developing a database in an effort to extend subsidised inputs and services to farmers.Photo: STAR

The government is developing a full-fledged database to use it in extending subsidised inputs and services to farmers and designing agri-related plans in future, officials said.
The database will also be used in sketching schemes to boost rural economy.
“The data will help us provide any type of supports to the farmers in future, and we will also prevent any system loss,” Agriculture Minister Matia Chowdhury told The Daily Star recently.
It is the second time the government is preparing such a list of farmers. The immediate past caretaker government prepared a list of about 67 lakh small and marginal farmers to extend direct cash subsidy to those who were suffering from high irrigation costs in 2008 Boro crop season due to increased diesel price.
Based on the list, the then government disbursed Tk 250 crore directly to 65.93 lakh farmers in fiscal 2007-08.
However complaints of irregularities were raised with a study by Bangladesh Institute Development Studies observing that about one-fifth of the total disbursed money went to wrong hands due mainly to faulty listing procedure.
The present government discontinued the cash subsidy on diesel for the last Boro season although budgetary allocations were there.
“We have taken it seriously. We will scrutinise the list to ensure any misrepresentation and error,” said Matia.
The agriculture officials said the new database will encompass all the Boro farmers across the country instead of covering only small and marginal ones, done by the caretaker government.
“We will use the database for any agri-related planning in future. It will also be useful to provide inputs and extension services to the farmers,” said CQK Mustaq Ahmed, secretary of agriculture ministry.
“It will help us get an idea about the overall agricultural and socio-economic scenario in rural Bangladesh,” he said, adding that the data will be available in the internet.
As part of the initiative, around 12,800 agriculture extension workers have been engaged in collecting information from root level with focus on farmers who cultivated rice during the last season of Boro, the biggest crop in Bangladesh.
Officials said information such as name and address of all the farmers, total land a farmer owns, and Boro cultivation area out of the total owned land has been collected.
Information on the type of irrigation facility farmers received has also been taken.
In case of the irrigation facility based on underground water, information whether the irrigation is provided by pumps run by diesel or electricity has been brought under consideration.
If the irrigation facility is taken on rental basis, the name of the pump operator or manager will be collected.
Agri-extension workers said they would complete the task of collecting information by early next month and the move to collect data about all Boro farmers has eased the work.
“The idea of collecting data about the farmers is good. We are not facing any pressure from any quarter to list anyone's name,” said a senior agri-extension official in Natore district.
“Each upazila will be given Tk 5,000 for completing the task. But we had to spend more than Tk 20,000 last year for printing the data collection forms and other purposes,” he said.
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