Bangladesh imported 76,000 tonnes of tomato in the last fiscal year (FY '22) despite the fact that the domestic production of the vegetable was a record 1.75 million tonnes, it was disclosed at a programme on Sunday.
Agriculture minister Dr Muhammad Abdur Razaaque, however, expressed his dissatisfaction over such huge imports when local farmers were losing on supply glut during the harvesting season.
He was addressing the programme, jointly organised by the Bangladesh Seed Association (BSA) and the agriculture ministry on Sunday in the city to mark rice seed distribution among flood affected farmers.
The BSA with the help of the Department of Agricultural Extension (DAE) has distributed 30 tonnes of rice seeds to 13,500 flood affected farmers at free of costs in Sylhet, Dhaka, Mymensigh and Rajshahi divisions.
Dr Razaaque said some of the farmers couldn't even get their investments in the tomato harvesting season amid huge production.
Despite such high production, the country also imports a notable amount of tomato which is a matter of concern, he mentioned.
He asked officials, researchers and seed companies to raise production of tomato in summer by adopting modern farming as well as sustainable seeds to avoid pricy imports.
However, the minister said there will be no shortage of food in Bangladesh and the country will not face problems like that of neighbouring Sri Lanka.
He said the government has taken initiatives to maintain sound production growth despite the occurrence of flood in many districts.
He said new rice varieties like BRRI dhan 89, 92, 100 has been giving 30 maunds yield per bigha.
"We are betting on such high yielding, stress tolerant varieties to keep maintain handsome growth of crop output," he added.
He also said that the seed companies should modernise their units following the international standard.
Agriculture secretary Sayedul Islam said many times farmers are being cheated by buying low quality seeds which affects them, as well as the production. The BSA should play a responsible role regarding the issue, he added.
BSA president M Anis Ud Daula presided over the event, held at the Bangladesh Agricultural Research Council (BARC) auditorium.
Agriculture additional secretary Abdullah Sajjad, executive chairman of BARC Sheikh Md Bakhtiar and director general of DAE Benazir Alam also addressed the event.
