RANGPUR: Despite the threat of climate change, attaining sustainable national food security is possible through ensuring best use of the cultivable land and latest technologies with newer cropping patterns to enhance crop output, reports BSS. The issue of food security has become the most important global issue as the adverse impacts of climate change have been posing a severe threat to agriculture, among many other sectors. According to agriculture and environment experts, there is no alternative to increasing production of foodgrain through making best use of cultivable land also for ensuring social peace, stability and harmony by coping with climate change impacts.
Talking to BSS, renowned rice scientist and Adviser Agriculture of BRAC International (South Asia and Africa) Dr M A Mazid put emphasis on bringing every inch of land under crop farming as the cultivable land area continues to shrink.
He said farmers should be trained and educated enough to cope with untimely droughts, floods, lack of rains or heavy rains those have been adversely affecting the agriculture sector hampering food production almost everywhere in the world.
There is no alternative to ensuring best use of land for food security through increasing crop yields at reduced costs, saving water, facilitating crop intensification, quality seeds and remunerative markets for the produce despite climate change, he added.
Agriculture and Environment Coordinator of RDRS Bangladesh Mamunur Rashid stressed on acquainting the farmers with modern agriculture, providing them with necessary facilities, quality seeds and inputs for increasing crop production.
He emphasized on delivering conservation agriculture based technologies with adoption of innovative crop rotation in which crops are planted in minimum, no-till or reduced tillage with some crop residue retention on soil surfaces to reduce unproductive losses of water.
Side by side ensuring best use of land, he suggested introduction of short duration rice farming, cropping patterns like rice-wheat-mungbean/jute, rice-potato-relay/maize, rice-vegetables-wheat and rice- sugarcane with intercropping of garlic, onion/vegetables.
Horticulture Specialist of Department of Agriculture Extension (DAE) Khandker Md Mesbahul Islam placed stress on ensuring best use of cultivable land adopting vegetables-based cropping pattern to enable farmers in getting maximum profits of their produce. He said a farmer can earn a net profit of up to Taka one lakh on an average from only 33 decimals of land through ensuring its best use and proper cropping patterns, inputs and technologies to produce four crops from the same land annually.
He said the country's northern region has been producing maximum quantity of vegetables to meet its national demand and export abroad to earn foreign exchange now with the prospect of earning higher amount.
Executive Director of Northbengal Institute of Development Studies Agriculturist Dr Syed Samsuzzaman asked the agri-scientists to innovate stress-tolerant crop varieties to keep food production increasing despite adverse climatic conditions.