GAIBANDHA: A total of 1,750 farmers of all the seven upazilas in the district got foundation seed of high yielding variety (HYV) jute from the government during the current season free of cost, reports BSS. Directorate of Jute distributed the seed of jute through upazila jute offices in the district under the project entitled ‘Production of HYV Jute and Jute Seed and Improved Jute Plants Rotting’. The objective of the jute seed distribution is to produce quality seed in farmers’ level so that they could farm jute next seasons to get desired output against the crop sowing the seed.To meet the demand of quality seed of jute in the country is another objective of producing seed in farmers level as lion’s share seed is to import from abroad every year, said an official of the directorate.
The seed were distributed to as many as 250 selected farmers of each of the upazilas. Each of them got 350 grams of seed of HYV jute from the offices to sow it on 20 decimal of land, he also said. M. Shamsul Alam, Shaghat upazila jute development officer, said only 15 percent jute seed is provided by Bangladesh Agricultural Development Corporation to the farmers of the country and the rest seed is imported from India to meet its demand. In this context, the Directorate of Jute had initiated to produce at least 15 percent seed in farmers’ level to reduce the import of jute seed to save foreign currency, he also said. M. Mazedul Islam, Sadar upazila jute development officer, said the  beneficiary farmers were being provided agri inputs and technological support from the offices to make the seed production a grand success. In reply to a question, Islam also said the farmers are so much happy to get more prices of jute this year comparatively the previous years as per maund (40-kg) of jute was being sold at TK 1,600-2,500 depending on its quality.