Profit from Sweet Jumbo grass

Commercial farming of Sweet Jumbo grass in sandy char areas in the Brahmaputra basin is becoming popular by the day.
It has been a successful effort to make the char people solvent in the last three years.
The grass, an Australian hybrid variety, comes as a quick fix to the fodder crisis for cattle in rainy season.
Eighteen nongovernmental organisations under the government's Char Livelihood Programme have been assisting people in farming the grass since 2008 in 19 upazilas of Kurigram, Gaibandha, Jamalpur and Sirajganj.
Inspired by success stories, the NGOs have launched a large-scale farming programme of the grass on 1,500 acres this season.
The first harvest of the grass comes a month after sowing seeds. A grower may get eight harvests from the same land and can count a net profit of up to Tk 50,000 per acre a year.
In fiscal 2008-09, some 650 char people farmed the grass on 110 acres in Roumari, Rajibpur and Chilmari upazilas under Kurigram. They produced 2,100 tonnes of grass and earned around Tk 40,000 per acre in the same period.
Last year, the amount of profit was Tk 50,000 for 1,150 farmers who cultivated the grass on 200 acres of sandy char lands and produced over 4,000 tonnes of grass.
Shahjahan Ali, 35, a farmer of Bozra Diarkhata in Chilmari upazila, said he sowed the grass seeds on 17 decimals of land this year.
An owner of 10 cows, Ali sold the grass for Tk 12,000 in two harvests in the last two months, after saving it up for his cattle. Ali looks to more profit as there are five harvests left.
Faridul Islam and Abdul Baten of Jadur Char in Roumari upazila and Saidur Rahman of Char Kodalkati in Rajibpur upazila said they have also earned a handsome profit by farming the grass on 20 decimals each.
Sumona Sharmeen, a trainer with nongovernmental organisation Rangpur Dinajpur Rural Service, said the milk production capacity of cows increases thanks to the nutrition-rich grass.