The government was going to conduct the 'National Comprehensive Land Survey' from the financial year (FY)'15, officials at a workshop said Thursday.
Secretary, Statistics and Informatics Division (SID) under the ministry of planning, Md Nojibur Rahman while speaking at the workshop said the government would conduct the survey to find out actual land use aiming to protect agricultural land. The workshop on "draft report on In-depth Country Assessment (IdCA) of Agricultural Statistics in Bangladesh" was organised by the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS) in collaboration with the Food and Agricultural Organisation FAO at the BBS Auditorium in the city.
BBS with the technical help of FAO has prepared the report which identified the strength and gaps of agricultural statistics. The report could help improve the country's existing methods, officials at the workshop said.
The SID secretary said, "To protect farmland and also ensure its proper distribution, the Executive Committee of the National Economic Council (ECNEC) has given approval for a national comprehensive land survey."
"In next one or two months we will finalise our plan of action by including all the relevant ministries and organisations," he said.
However, the SID secretary also mentioned that the Statistics Act 2013 had empowered the BBS to generate official statistics including that of agriculture. "The National Strategy for Development of Statistics (NSDA) has been established which will contribute to the national statistical system," he said.
FAO Consultant Rajiv Mehta presented the report on "In-depth Assessment of Country capacity to produce Agriculture and Rural Statistics in Bangladesh". Mr Mehta said the report had been prepared on the basis of a comprehensive study using 44 key indicators.
"Thirty-two of them are economic indicators 12, social and 3 environmental," he said.
Mr Mehta said Implementation of Global Strategy in Agriculture and Rural Statistics was a FAO global strategy to reposition the national and international agricultural and rural statistics systems to meet the requirements of various stakeholders in the 21 century.
He said Bangladesh was an anchor country and the report would be a role model for many other countries.
Additional Secretary, SID, Md Azizur Rahman, FAO representative in Bangladesh Mr Mike Robson, chief technical officer at FAO Mukesh K Srivastava, among others, also spoke on the occasion.
