Food is considered as a strategic resource. If it were not so, then the European Union (EU) countries would not be producing so much food but get the same imported at a relatively cheaper price for consumption. EU countries produce food --locally-- giving subsidies at both ends to farmers and consumers so that the real prices of the foods are not reflected in the prices.
But these subsidies are borne when imported foods can be far cheaper and subsidies can be avoided, from a recognition that food is a strategic resource and that countries or an economic community like the EC should be self sufficient in food products. This self sufficiency is for providing against unexpected situations like wars, blockade of sea lanes, etc., when imported foods may not be brought in adequate quantities from abroad to stave off starvation or famine conditions. If local capacities are always reared in a country to produce all or nearly all the foods its population requires, then that country can feel sufficiently hedged in relation to a basic need of its security or food security.
Bangladesh in 2007 found out the hard way why the local capacities for food production must be retained, always, on the high side. In that year, local crops failed on a large scale when import prices of foodgrains skyrocketed and food grains became scarce in the international markets. If nothing else, the lessons of 2007 must not be missed by the policy planners of the new government. It is high time for Bangladesh to develop short, medium and long term plans and to implement them in time for its sustainable and comprehensive food security.
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 severely even in the near future increasing the import dependency. Thus, it is high time for Bangladesh to devise and implement programmes to go on substantially increasing the production of food grains. This year's attainment of the target of boro rice production which was set at a higher level, shows that planned increases of food grain production are possible. This should now lead to planning for the long term to attain complete self-sufficiency in food grains at the fastest. The aim of such long term planning is to go on gradually increasing food grain production to ultimately double output.
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. There is a mismatch in the demand and supply growth already. This will only worsen in the years to come if vigorous steps are not taken from now to go on increasing food grain production.
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 challenge would be producing the increased quantities of the higher yielding seeds and distributing these efficiently to the farmers. The total demand for paddy seeds is 0.3 million metric tons. But the Bangladesh Agricultural Development Corporation (BADC) supplies 80 thousand metric tons and the rest of the 20 per cent of such seeds now used, are supplied by the private sector. Thus, both the BADC and the private sector will have to engage in time-bound hard activities to increase production of higher yielding seeds and to ensure their efficient distribution to farmers. BADC is expected to take the lead role in this area.
Apart from greater use of high yielding seeds, agriculture as a whole in Bangladesh should be modernized to a higher degree for higher productivity. Farmers in many areas are helping such a transformation on their own. Power tillers are replacing the traditional bullock and machines are being used for threshing in place of the manually operated systems. But this transformation needs to be much extended throughout the country through helpful official policies and supports. Besides, the governmental agencies must ensure timely availability of the various agricultural inputs in adequate quantities to the doorsteps of farmers at affordable prices.
The way chemical fertilizers are destroying soil fertility in Bangladesh is very worrying. There is a need for organic nutrients to be present in soil by some five per cent for maintaining its fertility. But such nutrients have declined to only one percent from over use of chemical fertilizers in Bangladesh, according to expert studies.
In this backdrop, it is heartening to note that the Bangladesh Institute of Nuclear Agriculture (BINA) has recently developed a high quality bacterial fertilizer which can be a blessing for Bangladesh. Every year, nearly 2. 8 million tons of urea are needed for agricultural production in Bangladesh. Out of this amount, some 1.2 million tons have to be imported.
There are many adverse sides showing up in the production, import and use of such urea fertilizers. First of all, gas supply to power generation units cannot be maintained at the desired level from the need to supply gas to the fertilizer factories. Secondly, the prices of imported fertilizers were found to be abnormally high last year. Urea had to be imported at double its price last year due to the much increased price of it in international markets. Thirdly, experts are more and more warning Bangladesh about the use of chemical fertilizers--specially urea--that depletes the soil's natural fertility.
Thus, the large scale use of the BINA invented fertilizer can bring about very great and favourable changes in the country's agriculture in areas of costs, safety and import substitution. This bacterial fertilizer can be marketed at a price far lower than the price of imported urea fertilizer. Indeed, the import of such fertilizer can become entirely unnecessary from its use and there would a big saving of resources as a consequence from this import substitution. Another very welcome aspect of its use will be preserving or even enhancing the fertility of the soil. The gas now used for making urea can be diverted to power generating plants to produced badly needed power.
Thus, in view of all of these positive developments to gain from, the government should lose no time to popularize extensive use of this fertilizer. There are also other forms of organic fertilizers in the country. The marketing of all of them should be promoted energetically for the same reasons. The new government that says that it would give highest priority to agriculture, ought to pay more attention to this issue.
The use of cheap and substandard chemical fertilisers also has the same undesirable effects. Reports frequently appear in newspapers about the smuggling into Bangladesh of low quality fertilisers which lead to short term higher yields but alarming degradation of the soil. Reportedly, the police some months ago seized 10,000 sacks that contained adulterated and contraband FMC fertlisers at Pabna . The FMC fertilisers were probably smuggled into the country from China. A ban on FMC fertliser remains in force for its harmful effects . But smuggled quantities of it are turned into dust and repacked and sold as Triple Super Phosphate (TSP) fertilisers which has a big demand . Besides, fake TSP fertlisers are also coming from India and getting marketed rather easily. Unregulated use of pesticides is also creating toxicity in the land and reducing its fertility on a large scale.
But land fertility is the most precious gift of nature that the ever increasing number of Bangladeshis will have to rely on for their food security. Therefore, it is imperative that the government's department of agricultural extension that trains farmers in safe farming practices should engage in extensive countrywide activities to discourage the use of low quality fertilisers. Law enforcement bodies will have to be more active to frustrate attempts to smuggle in such fertilisers. Farmers should be encouraged to practise rotation of crops, organic farming without pesticides or natural ways of pest control. Traditional manuring of the land with decomposed biomass to produce high yields used to be considered as safe practice. Now information has come from a northern district, Nilphamari, that the leaves of a plant called dhancha can be such an excellent and safe natural manure. Dhancha cultivation and its application as manure needs to be popularised throughout the country. Dhancha can be cultivated in fallow lands or on small patches of cultivable lands for the purpose.
New developments are noted such as the finding that a piece of land can be manured just as efficiently-- with one tenth of the urea currently applied on it-- by using urea in granule form. Similarly, it was found out that a great deal of irrigation water is wasted in Bangladesh fruitlessly. The fields can be irrigated by a fraction of such water with no adverse effect on output. There are also many other new processes calling for the attention of the planners. The same will have to be popularised or information about them disseminated to our farmers effectively and quickly as they are known.
