Sowing the seeds of climate resilience: local vendors as agents of change in BD

For Bangladesh, adaptation in agriculture against climate crisis has always been a key focus as it is not just a way of life but a lifeline for the country. Our key policy documents, the National Adaptation Plan 2050 and the Mujib Climate Prosperity Plan 2022-2041 have put great importance on the dire need of sustainable adaptation in agriculture sector on which depends our food security, health, economy, cultural heritage, and overall wellbeing. While there are several needs and challenges e.g., development of flood, salinity, and heat tolerant seeds, and improving fertiliser and pest management, it is well known that knowledge dissemination as well as capacity development of farmers and relevant stakeholders are the foremost requirement to achieve our adaptation objectives. However, ensuring this remains a major challenge for us.
Most of our farming communities reside in remote and hard-to-reach areas. Being a field researcher, over the last two years, I have been to some of the remotest climate vulnerable areas in Bangladesh: Mollarchar Union, Gaibandha; ChilmariUnion, Kurigram; South Sreepur Union, Tahirpur; and Southkhali Union, Srankhola, and more. Knowledge dissemination in these areas is an uphill battle as these areas face critical challenges including limited human resources, scarcity of essential services and infrastructures, fragile communication system, no or limited presence of development organisations, poverty, lack of collaboration between relevant stakeholders, limited access to technology, heavy reliance on traditional farming practice, and lack of awareness about getting information from appropriate sources. What strikes me most is that at a union level, the lowest tier of the agriculture department has only 3 Sub Assistant Agriculture Officers (SAAO) for direct field communication and monitoring-on average each SAAO is responsible to serve 900 farm households. This highlights the dire need to increase the number of filed level officers for effective service providing, maintaining service quality, and ensuring regular monitoring.
These drawbacks are the reasons why our farmers place heavy reliance on local vendors for crucial decisions-from seed selection to farming methods and the management of fertilisers and pesticides. This highlights a common but risky practice among farmers in rural communities. Because the local vendors lack expert knowledge and training, such dependence often leads to ineffective adaptation or even mal-adaptation. For example, misuse of pesticides and fertilisers, a result of inadequate knowledge, adds to the burden, causing crop damage, environmental harm and health risks-worsening their resilience to changing conditions. So, how can we address this critical gap in knowledge dissemination that would critically shape the scenario of agricultural adaptation in the country?
Drawing from the success of initiatives like the Katalyst project implemented by the Swiss Contact (2002-2018), which showcased the immense impact of collaborative efforts in advancing Bangladesh's agriculture, a targeted solution-empowering local vendors to bridge critical knowledge gaps, represents a promising strategy to tackle the challenges prevalent in remote farming communities. Success in the project's selected crops including maize and potato, proves that a nation-wide and sector-wide adoption is necessary for anticipatory actions against changing climates.
Because local vendors play a vital role in the lives of farmers in remote areas, we can take it as an opportunity to leverage this untapped resource to our advantage by equipping them with the knowledge of climate resilient farming. Doing this can largely bridge the knowledge gap and have a transformative impact on adaptation. Also, this transformation would enable us to overcome the challenges posed by limitations in human resources, budget constraints, technological gaps, and inaccessible locations.
This would be a cost-effective and efficient approach. Leveraging the existing network of local vendors who have regular contact with farmers and can quickly share up-to-date information would be more convenient because a conventional approach of increasing human resources in the agriculture department alone will not work for associated factors like inaccessibility of locations, bad communication systems, technological constraints on side of farmers, and lack of collaboration among stakeholders. Moreover, it empowers the community as local vendors will become agents of change advocating sustainable and climate-resilient farming practices leading to organized and informed local agricultural initiatives.
It is important to note that this initiative can inform national and regional policies with more granular data which will ensure that adaptation strategies are community centered and effective. This will also help to identify and integrate local and indigenous knowledge in modern scientific practices, ensuring a harmonious approach to farming. If successful, this can serve as model for other areas with similar challenges.
However, this should not be a standalone approach to avoid creating any bottleneck in information sharing and loss of knowledge quality. To ensure that, embracing a multifaceted approach such as organising monthly or bi-monthly training sessions in communities with participation of local vendors and agriculture officers can ensure enriched sources of information to farmers. Moreover, local vendors should be closely guided by agricultural officers through regular visits to monitor and support their needs. The officers' expert knowledge will allow them to efficiently address any challenges that may arise. To further bolster the initiative's efficacy, integrating digital knowledge platforms for continuous learning and accessibility to updated information, along with encouraging the involvement of tech-savvy youth as input sellers, can significantly fortify the knowledge dissemination process.
Having a regular monitoring system will facilitate capturing real-time data to aid further research and development-now a major gap in data availability for research and policy formulation. Local vendors should be trained to maintain registers keeping records of any problems, solutions given, and knowledge shared. This kind of data will be invaluable to assess the impacts and effectiveness of our adaptation strategies.
Empowering local vendors to become agents of change offers Bangladesh a cost-effective and practical solution to address the knowledge gap in remote agricultural communities. It can empower local communities by fostering community participation, valuing local wisdom, and can overcome our limitations in resources and access. With a transformative change, it also creates opportunity of accessing invaluable data that can inform better research and policy decisions.

Mohammad Budrudzaman is a researcher at SAJIDA Foundation, Dhaka, Bangladesh. [email protected]