To increase the importance and use of rooftop gardening across the country, Urban Agro-Production Support Projects have been planned to be implemented in 40 big cities of the country, officials said.
Urban Agro-Production Support Projects project director Md. Taherul Islam confirming this to Bangladesh Post said, “In the earlier phase, the pilot project has acted as a game-changer to increase city greenery, production, earnings, meeting nutrition needs and overall sustainable development of environment. Following its success, now we have planned to extend this program to other big cities of the country.”
The capital city’s air is being polluted day by day. The Department of Agricultural Extension (DAE) has recently completed the work of ‘Urban Agricultural Production Support (Pilot) Project’, which is also purifying and cleaning the polluted air. In continuation of this, big projects are being launcherd in the big cities including the divisions of the country.
Taherul Islam said, “Even after the completion of the two-year project, the beneficiaries are getting benefits. Under this project, it has worked in one upazila of Savar and six metropolitan areas of Dhaka. Under this 600 roof gardens, 600 irrigation plants, 600 kitchen compost plants, 60 gardens in school and college premises, 50 irrigation water harvesting, 300 officer training, 900 SAAO training, 900 entrepreneurs, investor Farmer, Gardener Training - 600 people have been planned for training.”
Due to the success of the project, work is now underway to adopt a large-scale project. A project worth Tk 100 crore is being prepared for this. It is expected that the large-scale project is going to start on a large scale soon.
He said, “If the project could be implemented across the country, it would become a recreation center for all ages of the family as well as produce fresh air, produce safe and nutritious vegetables without chemicals, produce domestic and foreign fruits.”
According to project sources, there are about four million buildings in Dhaka city. Of these, there are 13.5 lakh buildings where roof gardening is possible. As such, the amount of land is about 13000 hectares.
Taherul Islam said, “Roof-gardening will meet hobbies and needs on the one hand and on the other hand, there is an opportunity to benefit financially. There are opportunities for afforestation not only in the roof of the houses but also in different places including the verandah.”