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AGRICULTURE DEVELOPMENT UNIT
Agriculture is the main source of socioeconomic development of Bangladesh. A major portion of GDP of the country is added from this sector. The Agriculture Unit (AU) objective is to extend sustainable agricultural technologies and capacity building support to the doorsteps of farmers with a view to increasing farming productivity and ensuring food security of the country. This Unit enables the farmer to gain access to resources necessary for boosting crop production. Accordingly, the AU has designed its work plan and implementation strategy for the crops sub-sector. PSKS has successfully completed its 8th year of operation with the financial and technical support of PKSF.
Objectives
- To provide useful, modern and environment-friendly agricultural technologies;
- To establish market linkages of agricultural commodities;
- To develop skilled manpower on farming technology at farmer levels; and
- To assist in providing microfinance services considering the seasonality of agricultural activities.
Major Activities
- Introducing high value, high yielding, and climate-resilient crop varieties based on edaphic and climatic factors of locality;
- Conducting cluster-based demonstrations on proven profitable crop technologies;
- Introducing Good Agriculture Practices (GAP) at the field level for better crop production;
- Introducing safe crop cultivation practices (by using bio fertilizers and adopting bio control for pest management etc.);
- Promoting season-wise diversified crop cultivation through introducing suitable cropping patterns;
Promoting homestead gardening for proper land utilization, ensuring nutritional security of farming community and additional income; - Enhancing knowledge, skills and awareness of farmers as well as staff of PSKS through training, exposure visit, motivation etc;
- Conducting field days for effective dissemination of technology-related information and effective crop production techniques; and
- Operating ‘Agriculture Counselling Centre’ for instant solution of field-level crop-related problems faced by farmers.
Achievement
The AU demonstrated at the field level a number of high-value, high yielding and specialized nutrient or vitamin-enriched crop varieties including aromatic rice, zinc rice, nutrient-fortified rice, Tomato, capsicum, Brinjal, coriander, rose, broccoli, short-duration mustard, Red spinach, spinach. These demonstrations increased land productivity, cropping intensity, crop diversification and in contrary decreased disease suppression as farmers followed suitable crop rotation. AU is also expanding climate-smart agriculture through horticulture, spices, fruits, oil seeds cultivation at different Agro-Ecological Vegetable cultivation on the field borders for proper utilization of land and expansion of ‘Bagging Technology’ for safe fruits and vegetables production are other dimensions of its activities. Besides, Results-Based Monitoring (RBM) has been conducted to evaluate the activities of the Unit. It’s a great success of this Unit that a good number of expanded technologies — including summer watermelon, Broccoli, Cauliflower, Mango Thai katimon, Bari 11 mango, Malta bari 1, Vietnam Maltan and Guava Golden 8 – are being replicated by farmers at the field level.
Glimpses of Expanding Technology
Up to June 2023, a total of 708 demonstrations have been established on different agricultural technologies. These demonstrations include summer watermelon production, summer tomato production, high-value vegetables such as Bottle gourd, Bringal, squash by using mulching paper, Trico-compost production and market linkage, fruit bagging technology, safe crop production by following ICM and GAP etc. Besides, 27 field days have been arranged to disseminate the positive results of demonstrated technologies among a large number of farmers. The AU has also provided 29 USG applicators to fertilize rice fields, 3,450 pheromone lures to farmers for use on 1,15 acres of land for safe food production, 2,575 perching sticks for rice fields as part of IPM, 6,855 fruit bags for safe fruit production, and vegetable seeds to 3,64 households for homestead gardening. For learning and sharing the best practices of crop cultivation, Three exposure visits have been arranged. About two Upazila Planning Meetings were arranged under the Unit. Also, the AU organized 41 training for 1,025 person. ‘Krishi Poramorsho Kendra’ (meaning, agricultural consultation center) organized 75 for 4,325 person, where farmers get direct access to upazila-level agriculture, livestock and fisheries extension officers of the government.
