Develop tech to ease farmers' lives: minister

Agriculture Minister Matia Chowdhury yesterday asked agriculture scientists to develop new technologies to reduce the sufferings of farmers who toil to feed the nation.
She said farmers suffer from back pain and injuries to the fingers while applying guti urea, and the poor women farmers get water-borne diseases while collecting jute fibre.
“We cannot allow farmers to bear such sufferings just because they cannot change their occupation,” Chowdhury said at a workshop at the Bangladesh Agricultural Research Council (BARC) auditorium in Dhaka. “We all, including scientists, are dependent on them. So, we must think of reducing their sufferings.”
International Fertiliser Development Centre (IFDC) with support from USAID organised the workshop under a project -- Accelerating Agricultural Productivity Improvement (AAPI).
IFDC has been promoting guti urea, which is bigger in size than ordinary urea fertiliser and placed beneath soil in rice fields and helps increase rice productivity by around 20 percent with around 30 percent reduced use of urea.
Chowdhury said the technology requires more time and farmers face back pain in applying guti urea. However, she is now happy as IFDC has developed an applicator suitable for the farmers applying guti urea.
The minister distributed 50 such applicators to the farmers and said 500 more will be distributed among the farmers in the current aman season.
IFDC Resident Representative Ishrat Jahan said IFDC would continue to improve the applicator and distribute it among the farmers.
Agriculture Secretary Monzur Ahmed said the guti urea technology saves urea, increases productivity and saves the environment.
“This is something great,” he said. Bangladesh being a fertiliser importing country could save huge subsidies by using more guti urea, he added. Presently, guti urea is used on about six lakh hectares of land in the country.
USAID Mission Director Richard Greene also spoke.