Agriculture Minister Dr Mohammad Abdur Razzaque today called upon the agriculture scientists to find out ways to make rice production profitable to raising income of the farmers, reports BSS.
“The country has achieved self-sufficiency in food due to innovative role played by the agricultural scientists … so, now they have to find out ways on how rice production becomes profitable for the farmers,” he said, addressing the inaugural session of BRRI Annual Research Review Workshop in Gazipur.
The agriculture minister put emphasis on continuing safe and nutritious food production by developing new technologies that can ensure more outputs by using less inputs, according to a BRRI release here. Lauding BRRI scientists for their research achievements in agriculture, Dr Razzaque said due to the contribution of the agriculture scientists, the country has achieved self sufficiency as well as surplus status in food production.
Now new challenge has arrived to make rice production profitable as a part of the whole agricultural production system, he added. With BRRI Director General Dr Md Shahjahan Kabir in the chair, the workshop was attended, among others, by Additional Secretary of the Ministry of Agriculture Komalaranjan Dash, Professor Emeritus of Bangladesh Agriculture University Dr Abdus Sattar Mandal, Executive Chairman of the Bangladesh Agricultural Research Council Kabir Ikramul Haque and Director General of the Department of Agricultural Extension Dr Abdul Muid.
BRRI Director (Research) Dr Tamal Lata Aditya presented a key-note paper in the workshop. Experts and officials from different government and non-government organizations, including BRRI, BARI, BARC, DAE and IRRI, along with universities as well as farmers’ representatives attended the workshop.
