Land and living

Abdul Bayes For centuries, land has been considered the most important source of livelihoods of the people. As human civilisation advanced, use of this vital input also changed to suit society's needs. But for most part of the human civilisation, land area has always been too little to satisfy human wants. Furthermore, rapid growth of population, soil erosion, and competing claims from different sectors - all went to worsen the situation. That, possibly, prompted Malthus to forecast a doomsday for mankind in terms of hunger, malnutrition and natural disasters. However, the forecast has failed in the wake of technological breakthrough that boosted food production and the advent of population control measures that contained burgeoning population growth. We can argue that Malthus, possibly, could not think of these changes. And, the extent to which technology has penetrated agriculture for the sake of food security, land utilisation patterns also has been compatible with it. Most importantly for us, Bangladesh did not allow Malthusian gospel to materialise. Many other countries also had developed the means to overcome food and population problems and, thus, come out of the vicious circle of poverty. Bangladesh has one of the highest population densities in the world; she is more prone to natural calamities, and has to sacrifice roughly 1.0 per cent of the cultivated land every year to meet competing claims on her limited land base. Despite all the odds, the country did not have to face exposed-famine (shorob durvikhaya) for the last 30 years or so. The reason may be that widespread adoption of agricultural technology and concomitant changes in the land utilisation patterns paved ways for properly addressing the mouth-food mismatch. The distribution of cultivated land in different seasons appears to show that the Aus season - spanning from March to August - has almost lost its historic importance. This is reflected by a drastic deceleration in the share of land in that season. There was a time when the proportion of land in Aus season was almost at par with Boro or Rabi season (November-May). In subsequent periods, the pendulum swung rapidly and only about 20 per cent of land was cultivated in 2004 as against 80 per cent in Boro season. We reckon that two important factors have encouraged farmers to revisit their land use patterns over time : (a) access to timely water in Boro season and (b) higher profitability of the crop grown with that water. Thus, land under irrigation increased over time, especially in Boro season. This particular season also appears to have claimed some land from deep-water Aman. In consequence, the proportion of land used in Aman season also dropped significantly: from four-fifths in the past to two-thirds in recent periods. However, the trend on seasonal utilisation of land clearly signals that farmers have increasingly been tilting towards mechanised irrigated crops - pervasive in Boro season - and have been gradually withdrawing from Nature-dependent crops. Finally, we observe that the amount of cultivated land had been declining roughly by 1.0 per cent per annum which is quite in line with the observations from other studies. But the "missing land" also points to some policy directions, specifically raising the need for new technology and more allocations to agricultural research. Especially, the time has come for us to think about the introduction of a second generation of "green revolution. Another interesting development to record is the changing use of owned land. We observe that the share of land for homestead has gone down, possibly, for the production of homestead-based horticulture and vegetable crops. On the other hand, areas under ponds and gardens significantly increased to allow fish and vegetables production. Thus, in the face of shrinking cultivated land, rural households have somehow managed to compensate for the loss of output to be on an even keel. To reinforce the above observations, we can now pay our attention to the utilisation of irrigation-based land. Since irrigation is mostly related to HYV crops, the expansion of irrigation and the increase in the production of such crops should have closer links. By this we intend to imply that, over time, by shifting cultivated land towards the Boro season the farmers, in fact, moved towards growing more of HYV crops at the expense of the traditional ones. For example, two decades back, 36 per cent of the cultivated land could be brought under irrigation. The rapid growth of irrigation since then continued unabated and covered 82 per cent in 2007. This shows that Bangladesh had achieved praiseworthy progress in terms of increasing irrigated land. And since irrigation is needed mostly for HYV paddy crops, it can also be argued that Bangladesh performed remarkably well in the production of HYV paddy. Admittedly, the widespread cultivation of HYV paddy over time helped Bangladesh reduce its food deficit and, at the same time, save foreign exchange spent on the import of food grains. But it is only a part of the whole success-story. Besides boosting paddy output, a change in the strategy and the modes of irrigation has also taken place over time. In 1988, for example, shallow tube-wells (STWs) were used to irrigate about half of the total land. In 2007, the share shot up to three-fourths, implying pervasive use of these equipment in rural areas. The reason for the rise of STWs, and to some extent of Low-Lift Pumps (LLPs), could be attributed mainly to a liberalised import regime pursued to promote irrigated agriculture. As various research documents show, in the early 1980s and 1990s, the government removed or reduced import duties on irrigation equipment and accessories for a greater participation of the private sector in irrigation facilities. Such a policy change was brought forth with a view to encouraging farmers to grow more HYVs so that increased food production can help food security for the nation. Added to that is the multifarious uses of shallow machines, especially in transport. Notably, shallow machines have three important advantages: (a) small investments are required in procuring the equipment; (b) farmers have control of irrigation with ownership and (c) the equipment can very easily be moved across plots or places. However, the second important mode of irrigation in the past was indigenous methods; now almost on the verge of extinction partly due to construction of dams for flood control and partly due to a reduction in water flows in canals. But along with shallow machines, we also observe significant increase in the use of LLPs over time. The coming years should witness a surge in the use of modern varieties in ecologically backward areas. Emphasis on research and extension should constitute the main concern if progress in food production has to be sustained. In a regime of scarcity of land, there is no substitute for technological advancement. This is the only answer to a decline in per capita availability of land and food security. ...................................................... Abdul Bayes is a Professor of Economics at Jahangirnagar University. He can be reached at e-mail: abdulbayes@yahoo.com