Kutub Uddin
Flower Cultivator
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Photo: Star |
He fought against all odds to reach the pinnacle of success. From a bicycle repairman he is now one of the most successful farmers in Jhenidah.
Through his untiring labour and sincerity he has become an example for the locality and has changed his plight through the cultivation of unconventional crops and flowers.
This able farmer is Kutub Uddin, son of late Azim Uddin, of Baliadanga village under Kaliganj upazila in Jhenidah. His father passed away when he was only 13 and the future seemed bleak for young Kutub.
Upon completing his primary education from the Baliadanga Government Primary School, he dropped out and went to Kaliganj town hoping to get work.
At the age of 23, he came back home and started to grow rice, jute, wheat and vegetables. He had inherited only 32 decimal land and it was not before Kutub started growing flowers -- marigold and tuberose -- that he tasted sweet success.
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After his initial accomplishment, he took lease of a 4 bigha plot and expanded his farm, which is today a 17 bigha project.
Once upon a time he lived in a mud house with a tin roof but now he has made a decent dwelling for himself and for his family. He also acts as an entrepreneur, with 30 employees working for him. The women engage in making garlands, and the men are involved in the cultivation process.
Kutub Uddin informed that he has sold flowers worth Tk 8 lakh in a year and hopes that if the weather remains favourable his yearly turnout will be considerably higher.
Although deprived of the light of education, Kutub understands the importance of an enlightened upbringing and made sure that his two daughters get proper schooling.
A loving father and husband, Kutub Uddin has managed to attain economic salvation for his entire family.
Joynal Abedin, Union Chairman of Trilochonpur said, “Kutub Uddin is sincere about everything he does. Through his untiring effort that he put behind growing flowers he has proved once again -- hard work pays off!”
By Azibor Rahman
Abu Bakar
Fruit Farmer
Just five years ago, Abu Bakar Siddiqui was a man stuck in a desperate present, staring at a bleak future. He was unemployed and miserable with his seven-member family. Abu Bakar would go from door to door seeking help or work, but landless and illiterate, he could get neither.
Today, however, Abu Bakar Siddiqui, 35, of Shialapara village under Adamdighi upazila of Bogra district, is a solvent farmer. And his path to solvency? Pani phal (water caltrop). This fruit has helped him change his lot and become a beacon of hope for multitudes in our society who find themselves in the vice-like grip of poverty.
Desperate to find the means to sustain his family, Abu Bakar started to cultivate Pani phal as an experiment in some unused wetland. His first harvest saw him make a good profit. Encouraged, he decided to expand his operation and brought more land under cultivation. Later, he would lease around 24 bigha of wetland from the Railway department for his Pani phal project, and he has not looked back since.
Today, Abu Bakar has built a house for his family and sends his two children to school for education, which he never received. He has bought two bigha of land where he grows paddy and vegetables. Where there was once a desperate present and a bleak future, there is now a secure present and hope for better days ahead.
“There is no need for excessive amount of funds to cultivate Pani phal,” Abu Bakar said. He had spent only Tk 2000 against a bigha of land and has earned Tk 10,000 as profit. He estimated that he earns about Tk 2.4 lakh a year.
According to Abu Bakar, the cultivation of Pani phal is easy to organise since it requires neither a lot of labour nor a substantial capital. The seed or plant is readily available for wetland areas.
Abu Bakar's success has made many farmers in the neighbouring areas take notice. Some have already started cultivating Pani phal. Here is to a very fruitful future for them all.
By Golam Mostafa Jibon
Abdus Salam & Amir Hossain
Farmers & Biogas Plant Owners
Abdus Salam and Amir Hossain, of Dinajpur, set up a great example as farmers who turned biomass and waste into energy and ensured optimum use of bio-slurry to improve farmland's fertility.
Amir, a farmer of Birganj upazila of Dinajpur, set up a compost plant about three years back after receiving training on trico-compost production.
Amir said that he produced 400 kg trico-compost every 35 days using bio-wastes including cattle dung and poultry waste. As a test case, he used 300 kg trico-compost for the first time for cultivating potatoes.
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| Abdus Salam. Photo: Star | Amir Hossain. Photo: Star |
The potatoes yield rose by 120 kg in comparison to the previous year.
In the next season, Amir again used the bio-slurry and noticed that it again resulted in a good yield. Besides, use of fertilisers including urea and TSP dropped by 50 percent in comparison to the previous year.
After the potatoes season, in boro farming, he again used the trico-compost and noticed that it helped the farmland to retain irrigation water for four to five days while other farmlands could only retain water for two days. This also led to lower irrigation cost for him.
Amir now understood that the slurry he used in his farmland helped to restore the fertility, which was lost due to excessive use of chemical fertiliser.
On the other hand, Abdus Samad, a livestock farmer of Karimullahpur village under Dinajpur Sadar upazila, set up a bio-gas plant at his yard about three years back to meet his household demand.
The slurry produced from the bio-plant was used in farmland instead of the chemical fertiliser for producing crops.
Experts said that with the increasing population, the energy demand of the country is rising. But a biogas plant has a dynamic use in the household and also the agricultural sector.
“With the conventional sources of energy being limited, it is necessary to explore the possibility of utilising the widely available non-conventional energy sources, particularly biogas, which can be easily obtained by anaerobic digestion of organic wastes like cattle dung and various other animal excreta,” said AFM Mominul Haque, a specialist in Project Management of INNOVISION.
According to the data provided by INNOVISION Consulting Ltd, there are about 16,000 biogas plants in Bangladesh but proper utilisation of slurry produced from these plants does not always happen due to lack of knowledge among the farmers and biogas plant owners. But Amir of Birganj and Samad of Dinajpur Sadar set an example of multiple uses of bio-wastes.
At least 30,000 metric tonnes of bio-fertiliser can be produced from 16,000 biogas plants, which is helpful to get a good yield from about 1,00,000 acres of farmland. Besides, the long-term use of bio-fertiliser helps the land to restore its fertility, while excessive use of chemical fertiliser harms it.
INNOVISION Consulting Ltd sources said that the existence of land nutrition of five percent is standard while just one percent is found on average in the country caused by excessive use of chemical fertiliser. According to experts it's possible to set up at least 4,00,000 biogas plants in Bangladesh.
Salam said that he is now selling the bio-slurry to other farmers, which is also generating an earning. “Those who have just three to four animals can easily set up a bio-gas plant,” Salam said.
Salam and Amir have gotten ample experience to solve the local farming challenges and problems. They now need to share these skills, experiences and knowledge with the farmers working in the field.
Agricultural waste (biomass) is one of the most abundant indigenous fuel sources in the country. Biomass based alternative energy projects can play a vital role in overcoming the energy crisis in the country. The use of bio-slurry as a bio-fertiliser for improving land fertility also multiplies productivity of agricultural lands. Promotion of the biogas technology seems to be one of the best options.
AFM Mominul Haque added that biogas has proven to be a viable technology in Bangladesh; the technology provides nearly three times more useful energy than that of dung directly burnt and also produces nutrient-rich manure. Besides production of biogas, the plants can result in improving economic and financial conditions at micro as well as macro level and abating emission of greenhouse gases that has been polluting the environment due to its direct exposure, he added.
By Kongkon Karmaker