SYLHET: With a view to popularising the Bangladesh Institute of Nuclear Agriculture (BINA)-evolved high yielding varieties of paddy, BINA dhan, a Field Day of some demonstration plots was held on Saturday in the Laurergar area of Tahirpur upazila in Sunamganj district.
Senior Scientific Officer and BINA's Sunamganj Regional Centre in-charge Nurunnabi Mazumder, Scientific Officer Abdur Rakib and Mahbubur Rahman spoke on the short-duration and high yielding varieties in the presence of a good number of farmers.
The speakers said BINA-17 is a short-duration and high-yielding variety of paddy. It is cultivable for both Boro and Aman seasons, also suitable for haor areas. They spoke on various aspects of the variety and said that the farmers can easily cultivate other vegetables and mustard on the same land before Boro.
Some of the farmers, who cultivated the variety on their land, shared their experience of better yield from the short-time crop with the common farmers.
The per-hectare yield will be 5.5 tonnes from Bina-17 while 5 tonnes from Bina-16 variety, the officials said. Seed, fertilizer and other inputs are supplied for the demonstration plots, set under the guidance of Bina, the event was informed.
The farmers in the region should cultivate Bina paddy as safer varieties, the officials said demonstrating the harvested crops. They can easily harvest this early crop and can use the same lands for Boro paddy farming, the officials added.
Contacted, the DAE's Deputy Director, Sunamganj, Bimol Chandra Shome told this correspondent that the farmers in haor region was once dependent on only Boro paddy whereas now they are switching to various high yielding varieties including the Bina-evolved varieties during Aman season prior to mustard farming before the dry season's Boro paddy. Bina-7, Bina-16, Bina-17, Bina-20 and Bina-22 were cultivated on a total of 8412 hectares this season only.
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