Floods damage crops on 172,000 hectares of land: DAE

The floods damaged different standing crops on 172,000 lakh hectares of land while country’s chief agriculture official predicted that crop losses due to the current flood would not go over 10 per cent.Different standing crops including Aus, Transplant Aman, Broadcast Aman, Aman Seedbed, summer vegetables, jute, sugarcane, banana and green chilli on 172,043 out of 1,165,000 hectares of land have swamped with flood water at thirty-one districts across the country, the department of agricultural extension (DAE) shows at its latest report.

Of the standing crops, the Aus crop on 50,602 out of 4,88,085 hectares, Transplant Aman (T-Aman) on 1,363 hectares out of 41,951 hectares, Broadcast Aman (B-Aman) on 40,861 out of 1,66331 hectares and different summer vegetables on 15,513 hectares out of 117,547 hectares of land have been affected due to the flood, the report details.

In addition to this, the golden fiber jute on 45,209 out of 227,139 hectares of land, sugarcane on 565 hectares out of 2,744 hectares, banana on 352 out of 1,112 hectares, green chilli on 800 out of 6,197 hectares of land and other crops on 120 out of 7,124 hectares of land have been affected due to the flood water.

The DAE report, however, revealed that the floods have completely damaged different standing crops on 80,568 hectares of land while crops on 91,474 hectares of land have been partially damaged, it said.

Ruling out the food deficit due to the floods, director general of the DAE Mir Nurul Alam told BSS Tuesday that the country will suffer economic pressure due to the crop damage particularly jute, but he ruled out any kind of food shortage due to the floods.

The final crop loss is yet to be made which to be ascertained after recession of the flood water, said the official. “The primary report however showed that the production loss of the food grains due to the flood is approximately 328,562 tonnes or 10 per cent of the total rice production,” the DAE chief added.

Around 653,452 farmers have been affected due to the floods, according to the DAE report.

The flood affected districts are Sunamganj, Sylhet, Moulvibazar, Habiganj, Noakhali, Feni, Rangamati, Bandarban, Rangpur, Lalmonirhat, Gaibandha, Nilphamari, Kurigram, Bogura, Sirajganj, Brahmanbaria, Rajshahi, Natore, Faridpur, Madaripur, Chattogram, Cox’s Bazar, Pabna, Dinajpur, Jamalpur, Mymensingh, Sherpur, Netrokona, Naogaon, Tangail and Manikganj.