The government under the dynamic and prudent leadership of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has been working relentlessly to boost agricultural production to make the country self-reliant in food.

By adopting various demand-driven projects and initiatives, the government has already attained significant successes in this field during the last 15 years. The country's people are enjoying the fruits of the successes immensely.

The observation came at a daylong Rajshahi and Bogura regional workshop by agricultural experts, researchers, scientists and others concerned at Shilpakala Academy auditorium here Sutarday.

The Ministry of Agriculture (MoA) organised the workshop on behalf of its "Programme on Agricultural and Rural Transformation for Nutrition Entrepreneurship and Resilience in Bangladesh (PARTNER)" project.
Secretary to the MoA Wahida Akter addressed the workshop as the chief guest with Director General (DG) of the Department of Agricultural Extension (DAE) Badal Chandra Biswas in the chair.
 
Chairman of Bangladesh Agriculture Research Council (BARC) Dr Sheikh Muhammad Bokhtiar, Chairman of Bangladesh Agriculture Development Corporation (BADC) Abdullah Sajjad, DG of Bangladesh Agriculture Research Institute (BARI) Dr Debashis Sarker, DG of Bangladesh Rice Research Institute (BRRI) Dr Shahjahan Kabir and DG of Bangladesh Sugar Crop Research Institute Omor Ali also spoke.

The meeting was told that the MoA has adopted Taka 7,214 crore project to promote crop diversification and ensure food safety, aiming to gradually reduce the country's dependency on imports supported by the World Bank (WB) and the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD).

Under the five-year project, the government will provide "Krishak Smart Card" to each of 1.8 crore farmers so that they can get input subsidies and credit support, according to documents of the planning commission and agriculture ministry.

The project is intended to extend the cultivation area of non-rice cereals such as pulses, oilseeds and horticulture crops by two lakh hectares. Currently, the country has 88.29 lakh hectares of cultivable land.

It will also train up 20,000 youths and women entrepreneurs and build up resilience in the agro-food value chain of Bangladesh.

In her remarks, MoA Secretary Wahida Akter said they are hopeful to build a solid foundation for the country's agriculture sector through this project to face the challenges of the graduation from the least developed country status in 2026.

"Whatever we wanted to do in agriculture for so long, through this project, we want to coordinate everything," she said.

On distributing the "Krishak Smart Card", she said a database of farmers would be created across the country to ensure that the government benefits reach the real farmers.