Main challenge lies in ensuring access of the poor to food, says Muhith

Finance Minister Abul Maal Abdul Muhith said Sunday that the availability of food is not a problem for the coming days but it may be a challenge to ensure access of poorer section to food. This was stated Sunday by Finance Minister Abul Maal Abdul Muhith at the National Forum on "Improving the Bangladesh Country Investment Plan (CIP)" for agriculture, food security and nutrition, at a hotel in the city. "The Bangladesh Country Investment Plan (CIP) must be translated into actions through active resource mobilisation for the agriculture sector to help attain food security," he said. Food Planning and Monitoring Unit of Ministry of Food and Disaster Management organised the forum, in cooperation with Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and United Nations Agency for International Development (USAID). Food and Disaster Management Minister Dr Muhammad Abdur Razzaque presided over the session. Secretary of Food Division Barun Dev Mitra delivered the address of welcome. Agriculture Minister Begum Matia Chowdhury and Fisheries and Livestock Minister Abdul Latif Biswas were present as the special guests. FAO Representative Ad Spijkers and Deputy Chief of US Mission of US Embassy Nicholas Dean were also present as the guests of honour. The finance minister said Bangladesh needs very large investments to implement the CIP. Therefore, he said, a close partnership with development partners is vital for increasing food production in the country. "The Ministry of finance and the development partners are committed to allocating budgetary resources, grants and loans to the agriculture sector to attain food security and nutrition," he said. Begum Matia Chowdhury stressed on the diversification of food production considering the soaring foodgrain prices in the international markets. "Bangladesh suffers adverse impact of climate change though the country is not responsible for it. The farmers must be protected from losses of their crops due to climate change," she said. "Our population is increasing and the agriculture land is decreasing. We have no alternative but to produce more foodgrains," she said adding, "Bangladesh is producing and marketing high yielding varieties of rice and potato. We are undertaking soil and fertiliser management to boost our agriculture production". More on Page 7