He gives away those while exchanging new year greetings.

This year, on Friday, he distributed 5,250 saplings for free from his nurseries at Shaliabaha village in Ghatail upazila in Tangail. These included 3,000 lemon saplings, 2,000 of guava, and 250 of kamranga (star fruit). He also entertained all with panta bhat (fermented rice) and early variety of jackfruits, produced at his orchard. He has more about 10,000 saplings for distribution.

He distributed over 35,000 fruit saplings and 15,000 banana plants among local people, educational institutions and students for free in last four years.

Abdul Aziz, a former truck driver, introduces himself as 'Chasha (farmer) Abdul Aziz'. Local people call him 'Aziz Company'.

One day, about 20 years ago, Aziz had bought a ripe mango from Sadarghat in Dhaka. He sliced it and was surprised. The mellow mango was not ripe inside and tasted sour. He later came to know that traders ripen fruits by using harmful chemicals.

This small incident changed his life. He left truck driving and started raising a banana garden on his five acres of land. He used organic fertiliser and gradually discarded chemical fertiliser and DDT that keeps plants free of insects. He did not use chemicals for ripening banana. Within years, many other farmers in nearby Muraid, Mohishmara, Singherchala, and Dulalia villages in Ghatail followed him.

Now Aziz owns a big orchard of different fruits on 18 bighas of land. He produces different kinds of mango, jackfruit, pineapple, litchi, banana, lemon, olive, orange, coconut, blackberry ( a kind of berry), karamcha (a kind of fruit), guava, hog-plum, safeda ( a variety of apple), cherry and many other fruits in his hardens.

Last year Aziz earned about Tk 4,00,000 from his orchard and nursery--Tk one lakh from pineapples, Tk 70,000 from mango, Tk 15,000 from banana, Tk one lakh from lemon saplings and the rest Tk 1,15,000 by selling other saplings.

He has also planted over 1,500 palm trees around the orchards. These would give fruit and juice and also protect the plants from cyclone and earthquake, he told this correspondent during a visit on Friday.

Aziz said insecticides and hormones worth about Tk one crore is sold annually at 32 insecticide shops in Ghatail upazila alone. This enormous amount, if spent to produce organic fertiliser, could doubly benefit us by increasing yields and protecting human health, soil and environment, he said.

Now, over one crore pineapples are produced in Ghatail, where about 1, 600 hectares of land are under banana cultivation.

Garobazar is the biggest market of organic banana and pineapple in the area. This has been organised by Aziz.

Responding to his call, over 300 pineapple farmers in the area have given up use of insecticide in their orchards and chemicals for ripening. They include Abdur Razzak of Singherchala village, Jamal of Ashrabazar, Hassan Master of Lakkhindar and Shafiqul Islam of Kahalgaon village.