A village of award winning marginal farmers

Award winning former Abdur Razzak at his cucumber field. The photo was taken on Thursday. PHOTO: STAR

Abdur Razzak got the Presidential Award for agriculture in 1990. He got a record yield by growing hybrid cabbage using organic fertiliser. Next year, Kamrul Hasan Faruk got the award for outstanding performance. Faruk took to farming after obtaining the MA degree.

Kholahati village in Gaibandha Sadar upazila is well known in the official circle at the district headquarters as 10 to 15 farmers get awards at district agriculture fair every year. It is now a model village, about three kilometres from the district headquarter.

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They are happy and successful farmers with unbelievably small land holdings ranging from 0.10 to 0.60 decimal per family.

Most of farmers are also environmentally conscious. They hardly use harmful peticides. Ferromon traps evolved by the Bangladesh Agriculture Research Institute (BARI) were seen on fields to kill insects.

But the scenario was not the same even ten years back, when starvation stalked the area due to recurring floods.

They changed their life by vegetable cultivation. The credit goes to Mosharaf Hossain, Block Supervisor of the Department of Agriculture Extension (AED) and other agriculture officials.

AED set up demonstration plots, motivated them to grow high yielding vegetables and provided all technical support and advice.

Marginal farmer Yesin Ali cultivated hybrid tomato on a 0.60 decimal land in the last season and earned Tk 50,000.

"Intensive cultivation is the main thing", he told this correspondent during a recent visit to the village. He was harvesting hybrid ladies finger. "Small holdings give better yields if scientific methods are applied and proper nursing is done", he said.

"Two bighas of land are enough for an average family for commercial cultivation of vegetables.

"Vegetable is more profitable than paddy, jute or sugarcane", he said.

Another farmer Abdul Jalil earned Tk 20,000 from summer vegetables on a 0.34 decimal plot in the last two months.

Abdul Quddus is a landless farmer. He grew vegetables on 0.42 decimal land as a share cropper. Quddus said he earned about Tk 15,000 by growing two summer vegetables in the last five months after giving the share to the landowner.

"We supply at least fifty percent of total demand for vegetables in Gaibandha town", said model farmer Kamrul Hasan Faruk.

Housewives in the village are not lagging behind.

Marjina Begum grows vegetables on their 0.40 decimal land adjacent to their house as her husband Akram Hossain remains engaged in the field. Like her, Shahida Begum, Anowera Bibi, Rahima Khatun also supplements their family income by raising vegetables on courtyards.