Recognition for contribution to agriculture

FE Team | Published: June 23, 2024 20:15:47

It is a welcome piece of news that the government is all set to honour 22 farmers with 'Agriculturally Important Person (AIP)' status for their outstanding contribution to the development of the country's agriculture sector. Introduced in 2020, the first round of this unique award giving ceremony was held in July 2022, when 13 farmers were given AIP recognition for their valuable contribution to the sector. The AIP status holders get various benefits that the Commercially Important Persons (CIPs) are entitled to. This recognition is expected to provide a big morale boost to those working for the betterment of the agricultural sector. The AIP recognition is a step in the right direction, but it needs to be extended to stakeholders making extraordinary contribution to the sustained growth and development of the agricultural sector.
For a resource-constrained Bangladesh, agriculture is the foremost driver of economic development and growth. During the pandemic of Covid-19, when most sectors were struggling to stay afloat, the agriculture sector showed resilience and helped the nation avert a food crisis. This vital sector is now facing a dire threat due to shrinking arable land and climate change. The graveness of the situation may easily be perceived from the fact that cultivable land of the country is decreasing at the rate of one per cent a year due to indiscriminate urbanisation and industrialisation. Worse still, the climate change triggered by global warming has cast a negative impact on agriculture production in the country. Against this backdrop, the need for increasing agricultural productivity cannot be overstated.
Awarding AIP status to outstanding farmers is intended to motivate innovative ideas for expansion of the agricultural sector. Although it is publicised that farmers are being recognised, the AIP recognition mainly went to owners of big commercial agricultural farms and agro-processing industry and agricultural scientists for developing high-yielding crop verities, innovative production methods and farm equipment. The country's agriculture has come a long way off in terms of research and development of new strains of crops, crop diversification, helping it attain near self-sufficiency in food production. These achievements of the sector not only contributed to the relative economic stability of the country but also to an increased calorie intake of the people and poverty reduction. Agricultural scientists deserve AIP awards.
Involvement of big farms in the agricultural sector is also necessary and they need to be incentivised as well. Big farms can produce crops and livestock on a larger scale, leading to better utilisation of shrinking arable land, higher yields, a boost in agricultural exports, incorporation of modern and sustainable farming practices and so on. Regrettably, big farms in Bangladesh are accused of establishing oligopolies in the market, leading to increased prices of agricultural outputs. The authorities, therefore, need to thoroughly scrutinise the role of big farms before awarding their owners the AIP status. Meanwhile, the involvement of an increasing number of educated youths has brought the much-needed dynamism and growth to the agriculture and livestock sectors. These forward-thinking youths, instead of pursuing traditional jobs after graduation, have engaged in the agricultural sector, demonstrating their entrepreneurship. Their contributions should also be duly recognised. Last but not least, there are farmers like Haripada Kapali who created Haridhan through natural hybridization certainly deserve such state recognitions before the rare breed of resourceful farmers with little or no formal education become extinct.