Promotion of laser land leveling in Boro paddy farming accurately can be the effective means of saving at least 25-30 percent irrigation water apart from boosting the yield in Barind area.
Land pattern of the vast Barind tract is uneven naturally meaning that the water usage and uptake by the Boro plant is uneven causing negative impact to the paddy production as a whole. Farmers in general should be habituated to the farm mechanization, including laser land leveling, for their welfare to mitigate the situation.
Scientists, researchers and development activists made the observation unanimously while addressing a farmers' field day titled "Laser leveling of Boro paddy field in Barind Tract for efficiency of AWD method" at Kajolkeshore village under Nachole Upazila in Chapai Nawabganj on Monday. On behalf of the 'Introducing Water Efficient Technologies to Barind tract Project', DASCOH Foundation and Syngenta foundation jointly organized the farmers meeting supported by the Coca cola Foundation and World Bank Group. The meeting discussed and devised ways and means on how to prioritize quick dissemination of the knowledge, farmers' adaptation and business case development.
It also focuses on knowledge transfer, exposure visit and on-field technology transfer to demons
trate and validate efficiency at practical level.
Principal Scientific Officer of Bangladesh Wheat and Maize Research Institute Dr Ilias Hossain, Upazila Agriculture Officer Abdun Nur, Project Director-of Dascoh Foundation Fakhrul Basher and Project Manager Shohidul addressed the meeting as resource persons disseminating their expertise on the issue. Dr Ilias Hossain said laser land leveling is a proven technology in terms of saving 25-27 percent irrigation water and fertilizer application procedure and functions in Boro paddy field side by side with increasing yield.
Abdun Nur mentioned that around 1600-2000 liter water is usually used to produce one kilogram of paddy by the farmers in the conventional method which is excess use of water.
He added that precision laser leveling methods are very important to save water together with more production. Shohidul Islam opined that a laser leveling machine plays a big role to
leveling the paddy field as well as to save irrigation water through a precision laser leveling system.
He identically observed that the region's agriculture is facing many challenges including climate change, labour shortage, irrigation water scarcity and increase in crop cultivation cost. So, promotion of farm
mechanization has become indispensable to address the multiple problems. Fakhrul Basher mentioned that large-scale adoption of farm mechanization can be the effective means of facing the existing agriculture related challenges in the drought-prone Barind area.
