Building food security in the mid and longer terms
Saturday, 22 May 2010
Enayet Rasul Bhuiyan
THERE are very compelling reasons to explain why much increasing the production of food grains ought to be a very high priority for Bangladesh. The country is able to maintain a balance of sorts between its basic food supply requirement and present population with some dependency on imported food grains. But this balance could strain even in the near future increasing the import dependency when worldwide food shortages and higher prices of staple foods are noted.
Bangladesh's population is projected to reach 180 million only a decade and half from now. So, production increases of food grains will be basically required. But the growing population will also create the need for other foodstuffs or food related products such as pulses, spices, vegetables, oil seeds, etc. So, production increases of all of these foodstuffs will have to be also aimed for under a comprehensive plan in an integrated manner to get the desired cumulative results. Raising their local production will not only save hard currency but spare their consumers the pains of paying for the escalating higher prices of these imported goods. Planned large scale production of these non cereal crops will have to be attempted and in this endeavour the different official agencies meant to support agriculture will have to come together and get their act together in a coordinated fashion to help and encourage the farmers.
Thus, it is high time for Bangladesh to devise and implement programmes to go on substantially and sustainably increasing the production of food grains and other food or food related products. Of course, some romantically inclined ones in the policy planning of the country may dismiss off any suggestion of food security to be faced by the country in the future as scaremongering. They may say that government has a hefty foreign currency reserve now, bigger than at any time in the past. Spending a part of this burgeoning reserve, it would be in a position to import foodgrains and kitchen items in large quantities to offset any hardships on the part of consumers, they would contend.
But such calculations are flawed basically for the reasons that a poor country like Bangladesh needs to conserve as much as possible its forex reserve or needs to spend it for optimum returns. Foreign currencies spent on purely consumption activities such as for food consumption, fetch no returns. But when foreign currencies are utilized to import capital machinery and raw materials for production activities, the same create the badly needed economic growth to alleviate poverty by creating income and wealth.
Besides, all countries in varying degrees ought to consider successful food production with their own capacities as unavoidable and cardinal duties for strategic economic reasons. If this was not the case, then the countries of the European Union (EU) would not be subsiding their farmers massively in order to keep them motivated in food production. EU countries can easily buy food at cheaper prices from international markets that would make the subsidies redundant. But they prefer to maintain the subsidies out of concern for sheer security.
Dependence on foreign food can be dangerous. Prices of imported foods do fluctuate and may rise high in the event of worldwide shortages from various factors. Therefore, every country is expected in varying degrees to try and raise as much food as it can with its own capacities to guard against any unfavourable situation. Senior citizens in Bangladeshis should have memories of the 1973-74 famine that tuned worse only when foreign supplies of food failed to reach this country in time for various reasons. They should have relatively fresh memories of natural disaster related shortfall in foodgrain production in Bangladesh only some years ago just before the takeover by the immediate past caretaker government that continued well into the tenure of that government. The country faced a very uphill situation at that time from the requirement to import food grains in the backdrop of fast rising prices in that period amid other uncertainties as the supplying countries also did not have much of an exportable surplus.
Thus, it is not pragmatic to wish away the food related concerns because raising enough quantities of food, locally, happens to be a core need linked to the security of the country or the basic well-being of its population.
Besides, every year, the country is seen losing nearly 80 thousand hectares of arable lands due to river erosion, building of houses and infrastructures. Thus, one per cent of arable lands is getting lost annually when the demand for food is rising at a rate of 1.4 per cent annually from population growth and other factors such as the rising purchasing power or demand from consumers. Thus, there is a mismatch already in the demand for food grains and the capacity available to produce it and this trend will only worsen in the years to come if vigorous steps are not taken from now to go on increasing agricultural productivity.
The strategy for Bangladesh to that end will have to be one of increasing production from limited or shrinking areas of cultivable lands. But this should not be considered as a serious negative factor because all the possibilities are there for higher productivity from the limited lands.
According to experts, Bangladesh can attain a major increase in its food grain production immediately by only expanding the use of the higher yielding varieties of seeds. Only 20 per cent of the farmlands are now covered by high yielding seeds. If the rate of use of such seeds can be extended by 60 per cent from the present rate, then it would be possible to produce an additional 30 million tons of rice.
The Bangladesh Rice Research Institute (BRRI) has so far invented 47 new higher yielding varieties of rice. But only a handful of them have been popularized although there are at least a dozen varieties which can yield substantially higher outputs than the ones which are being cultivated. Specially, the high yielding varieties developed by BRRI to withstand drought and salinity, are still considerably unknown or remain unutilised in some parts of the southern regions. The greater part in the coastal areas can raise only one rice crop a year. But these areas could grow several crops in a year if the new varieties-- developed to withstand adverse conditions-- were made familiar to farmers there. Thus, there is not so much a lack of research into new varieties but the neglect or incapacity on the part of the Department of Agricultural Extension to give hands down training to farmers extensively throughout the country. This department needs to maintain regular liaison with BRRI and undertake a countrywide programme for the new varieties of seeds developed by the latter to actually find widespread field level applications.
The main asset of Bangladesh's agriculture is the fertility of the soil. But this fertility is under a threat from spurious fertilizers and improper use of fertilizers. The sale of sub-standard fertilizers will have to be sternly regulated. The improper use of fertilizer such as excessive use of urea should be discouraged and the agricultural extension department under the agriculture ministry should educate farmers extensively on how to get adequate yields from scientific use of less amounts of urea and other fertilizers. Organic fertilizers which are safe for the soil and also as productive as chemical ones are being produced in the country. The use of these fertilizers should be popularized as these are not only comparatively cheaper and help import substitution, the same are extremely helpful to preserve the natural fertility of the soil.
The comprehensive policies towards food security will also have to effectively address issues of creating sufficient storage spaces for food grains and adequate preservation facilities for agricultural produces like potatoes, tomatoes, other vegetables and fruits ; maintaining incentives to farmers by reaching government's various intended benefits and facilities to them including subsidies incorruptibly and efficiently ; ensuring the getting of remunerative prices by producers ; promoting modernization of agricultural techniques ; and, further spreading the opportunities for acquiring diverse forms of education related to agriculture.
THERE are very compelling reasons to explain why much increasing the production of food grains ought to be a very high priority for Bangladesh. The country is able to maintain a balance of sorts between its basic food supply requirement and present population with some dependency on imported food grains. But this balance could strain even in the near future increasing the import dependency when worldwide food shortages and higher prices of staple foods are noted.
Bangladesh's population is projected to reach 180 million only a decade and half from now. So, production increases of food grains will be basically required. But the growing population will also create the need for other foodstuffs or food related products such as pulses, spices, vegetables, oil seeds, etc. So, production increases of all of these foodstuffs will have to be also aimed for under a comprehensive plan in an integrated manner to get the desired cumulative results. Raising their local production will not only save hard currency but spare their consumers the pains of paying for the escalating higher prices of these imported goods. Planned large scale production of these non cereal crops will have to be attempted and in this endeavour the different official agencies meant to support agriculture will have to come together and get their act together in a coordinated fashion to help and encourage the farmers.
Thus, it is high time for Bangladesh to devise and implement programmes to go on substantially and sustainably increasing the production of food grains and other food or food related products. Of course, some romantically inclined ones in the policy planning of the country may dismiss off any suggestion of food security to be faced by the country in the future as scaremongering. They may say that government has a hefty foreign currency reserve now, bigger than at any time in the past. Spending a part of this burgeoning reserve, it would be in a position to import foodgrains and kitchen items in large quantities to offset any hardships on the part of consumers, they would contend.
But such calculations are flawed basically for the reasons that a poor country like Bangladesh needs to conserve as much as possible its forex reserve or needs to spend it for optimum returns. Foreign currencies spent on purely consumption activities such as for food consumption, fetch no returns. But when foreign currencies are utilized to import capital machinery and raw materials for production activities, the same create the badly needed economic growth to alleviate poverty by creating income and wealth.
Besides, all countries in varying degrees ought to consider successful food production with their own capacities as unavoidable and cardinal duties for strategic economic reasons. If this was not the case, then the countries of the European Union (EU) would not be subsiding their farmers massively in order to keep them motivated in food production. EU countries can easily buy food at cheaper prices from international markets that would make the subsidies redundant. But they prefer to maintain the subsidies out of concern for sheer security.
Dependence on foreign food can be dangerous. Prices of imported foods do fluctuate and may rise high in the event of worldwide shortages from various factors. Therefore, every country is expected in varying degrees to try and raise as much food as it can with its own capacities to guard against any unfavourable situation. Senior citizens in Bangladeshis should have memories of the 1973-74 famine that tuned worse only when foreign supplies of food failed to reach this country in time for various reasons. They should have relatively fresh memories of natural disaster related shortfall in foodgrain production in Bangladesh only some years ago just before the takeover by the immediate past caretaker government that continued well into the tenure of that government. The country faced a very uphill situation at that time from the requirement to import food grains in the backdrop of fast rising prices in that period amid other uncertainties as the supplying countries also did not have much of an exportable surplus.
Thus, it is not pragmatic to wish away the food related concerns because raising enough quantities of food, locally, happens to be a core need linked to the security of the country or the basic well-being of its population.
Besides, every year, the country is seen losing nearly 80 thousand hectares of arable lands due to river erosion, building of houses and infrastructures. Thus, one per cent of arable lands is getting lost annually when the demand for food is rising at a rate of 1.4 per cent annually from population growth and other factors such as the rising purchasing power or demand from consumers. Thus, there is a mismatch already in the demand for food grains and the capacity available to produce it and this trend will only worsen in the years to come if vigorous steps are not taken from now to go on increasing agricultural productivity.
The strategy for Bangladesh to that end will have to be one of increasing production from limited or shrinking areas of cultivable lands. But this should not be considered as a serious negative factor because all the possibilities are there for higher productivity from the limited lands.
According to experts, Bangladesh can attain a major increase in its food grain production immediately by only expanding the use of the higher yielding varieties of seeds. Only 20 per cent of the farmlands are now covered by high yielding seeds. If the rate of use of such seeds can be extended by 60 per cent from the present rate, then it would be possible to produce an additional 30 million tons of rice.
The Bangladesh Rice Research Institute (BRRI) has so far invented 47 new higher yielding varieties of rice. But only a handful of them have been popularized although there are at least a dozen varieties which can yield substantially higher outputs than the ones which are being cultivated. Specially, the high yielding varieties developed by BRRI to withstand drought and salinity, are still considerably unknown or remain unutilised in some parts of the southern regions. The greater part in the coastal areas can raise only one rice crop a year. But these areas could grow several crops in a year if the new varieties-- developed to withstand adverse conditions-- were made familiar to farmers there. Thus, there is not so much a lack of research into new varieties but the neglect or incapacity on the part of the Department of Agricultural Extension to give hands down training to farmers extensively throughout the country. This department needs to maintain regular liaison with BRRI and undertake a countrywide programme for the new varieties of seeds developed by the latter to actually find widespread field level applications.
The main asset of Bangladesh's agriculture is the fertility of the soil. But this fertility is under a threat from spurious fertilizers and improper use of fertilizers. The sale of sub-standard fertilizers will have to be sternly regulated. The improper use of fertilizer such as excessive use of urea should be discouraged and the agricultural extension department under the agriculture ministry should educate farmers extensively on how to get adequate yields from scientific use of less amounts of urea and other fertilizers. Organic fertilizers which are safe for the soil and also as productive as chemical ones are being produced in the country. The use of these fertilizers should be popularized as these are not only comparatively cheaper and help import substitution, the same are extremely helpful to preserve the natural fertility of the soil.
The comprehensive policies towards food security will also have to effectively address issues of creating sufficient storage spaces for food grains and adequate preservation facilities for agricultural produces like potatoes, tomatoes, other vegetables and fruits ; maintaining incentives to farmers by reaching government's various intended benefits and facilities to them including subsidies incorruptibly and efficiently ; ensuring the getting of remunerative prices by producers ; promoting modernization of agricultural techniques ; and, further spreading the opportunities for acquiring diverse forms of education related to agriculture.