Speakers at a programme on Tuesday laid emphasis on providing incentives and bank loans to the shrimp farmers along with policy support to help the sector emerge as a major one in consideration of its great potential.
They also noted unlike the agriculture sector, especially crop farming, the water resources, fisheries and livestock sectors could not flourish to the expected level due to the lack of proper leadership.
The views came at the second policy workshop on 'Building Trade Capacity of Small Scale Shrimp and Prawn Farmers in Bangladesh: Investing in the Bottom of the Pyramid' at the Palli Karma Shahayak Foundation (PKSF) in the city. PKSF with support of the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), Bangladesh Shrimp and Fish Foundation (BSFF), Standards and Trade Development Facility (STDF) and the government of Bangladesh organised the workshop.
The STDF project was implemented during the period of 14 months from October 2013 till June 2015 at a cost of $ 568,750.
State Minister for Finance MA Mannan was present as the chief guest while senior secretary of commerce Hedayetullah Al Mamoon was special guest. BSFF chairman Syed Mahmudul Huq moderated the event with PKSF managing director Abdul Karim in the chair.
Fisheries Department assistant director Saniar Alam made a presentation on the project.
Under the project, 1000 shrimp farmers have been selected for 40 clusters from five upazilas of three southern districts, namely Khulna, Bagerhat and Satkhira. There was a study on the farm management as well as stocking and growth performance.
The study showed that within the project tenure there had been a substantial increase in production-48 per cent-and the model developed under the project offered interesting lessons for application and replication in other parts of shrimp and fish growing areas of the country.
PKSF and BSFF signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) under which the PKSF will provide microcredit to the small shrimp farmers.
In his comment, former Bangladesh Bank (BB) governor Saleh Uddin Ahmed said shrimp farming is a big export-oriented sector, for which big investments are required. Microcredit support can upscale the sector for the time being.
"With 1000 farmers on a small scale you cannot ensure good quality as well as business approach. You have to mainstream financing for upscaling the project," he said.
He also said although BB talked about inclusive financing, it was limited within small and medium enterprises (SMEs). Shrimp farming does not get attention there. It will be difficult to depend on microfinance for the whole life to upscale the project.
Referring to the guideline for the tenant farmers who get loan showing a certificate, Mr Ahmed said the guideline could be applied to the small shrimp farmers and a policy could be formulated to lease out jalmohals or water bodies to them.
Mr Ahmed also said time was ripe to institutionalise the shrimp sector and formalise it as it passed the quality test many years ago.
In reply to a comment of commerce secretary, the noted economist said Bangladesh does not always follow the model of other countries; rather many creative models grow here. But those cannot be advanced any far and replicated.
Mr Ahmed cautioned about replicating the present model and suggested expanding the experiment area to other parts of southern Bangladesh before replicating.
MA Mannan said shrimp farming is an important sector in the economic progress of Bangladesh. The government does not do business rather its duty is to ensure wellbeing of the labourers of various export sectors like ready-made garment (RMG) and leather.
Former secretary QCK Mustak Ahmed said Bangladesh had got leadership in the crop sector and not for water resources and fisheries and livestock. Shrimp farmers should get adequate funding for ensuring farm management and compliance.
Hedayetullah Al Mamoon said all policies would fail if there was not enough funding. Bangladesh could not benefit from poverty reduction by following various models of the Western countries.
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