PABNA, Jan 09: A good numbers of peasants are passing busy time growing onion on a commercial basis this season in Sujanagar upazila of Pabna district.
The farmers of the upazila are expecting good yield and fair market price if they are provided necessary agri-input.
According to Department of Agriculture Extension (DAE) the farmers have already sowed onion seeds on 16,500 hectares of land and the process is going on in a full swing.
DAE added that the government and non-government organisations (NGOs) have jointly taken adequate steps to make the onion farming a success.
For repeated bumper production and fair market price, the peasants of the upazila are encouraged to bring more cropland under the spice farming this season. They had made over Tk 50,000 to 60,000 cultivating a bigha of land last year.
Peasant Abdul Mazid of the upazila said he has taken preparation to bring some twelve bighas of land under onion farming. Among them, he cultivated the crop on four bighas of land. Within next week, he will finish sowing seeds successfully, he added.
The farmers have to spend Tk 20,000 to 25,000 to cultivate a bigha of land on onion farming and make over Tk 50,000 to 55,000 after paying production cost every season. Onion farming is the main means of livelihood of the farmers of the region.
Farmers have begun sowing the seed of the spice from first or last week of December. If the crops grow well, the farmer can harvest over 40 to 50 maunds of crops from a bigha of land.
Upazila Agriculture Officer Moinul Hasan said DAE has set a target of producing a large quantity of onion from over 1600 hectares of land during the current season. He also said the farmers have been provided all sort of necessary agri-input this season.
