Farmers can 'ride out climate change with right farm inputs'
Friday, 3 December 2010
FE Report
Bangladeshi farmers are capable of facing the impact of climate change if they are given right inputs at the right time, a senior UN Food and Agriculture (FAO) official said.
Emmanuel Moncada, an FAO operations officer based at its headquarters in Rome, said Sunday all farmers need are quality seeds, fertilizer, farm equipment and technical know-how to ride out the natural disasters caused by global warming.
Moncada made the comments in Satkhira, a southwestern district worst hit by climate change, where the FAO handed over free farm tools and inputs to more than 200 farmers.
He said donors have responded to Dhaka's call for aid to climate change affected people with the European Union alone donating 7.5 million euro to FAO for providing farm inputs and technical expertise to Bangladeshi farmers.
The EU-FAO project will benefit 82,000 farmers in at least 10 southern districts.
Senior government agriculture officials also spoke on the occasion and they stressed planting trees, which are favourable to Bangladeshi environment and can be good a source of earning.
"The farmers have to be conscious about (the danger of) climate change," said Rafikuzzaman, deputy director of Satkhira agriculture department.
Satkhira district bore the brunt of two recent cyclones -- Sidr in November 2007 and Aila two years later - that left at least 5,000 people killed, made millions of people homeless and damaged vast swath of farmland.
Bangladeshi farmers are capable of facing the impact of climate change if they are given right inputs at the right time, a senior UN Food and Agriculture (FAO) official said.
Emmanuel Moncada, an FAO operations officer based at its headquarters in Rome, said Sunday all farmers need are quality seeds, fertilizer, farm equipment and technical know-how to ride out the natural disasters caused by global warming.
Moncada made the comments in Satkhira, a southwestern district worst hit by climate change, where the FAO handed over free farm tools and inputs to more than 200 farmers.
He said donors have responded to Dhaka's call for aid to climate change affected people with the European Union alone donating 7.5 million euro to FAO for providing farm inputs and technical expertise to Bangladeshi farmers.
The EU-FAO project will benefit 82,000 farmers in at least 10 southern districts.
Senior government agriculture officials also spoke on the occasion and they stressed planting trees, which are favourable to Bangladeshi environment and can be good a source of earning.
"The farmers have to be conscious about (the danger of) climate change," said Rafikuzzaman, deputy director of Satkhira agriculture department.
Satkhira district bore the brunt of two recent cyclones -- Sidr in November 2007 and Aila two years later - that left at least 5,000 people killed, made millions of people homeless and damaged vast swath of farmland.