Govt sets target to produce over 44.1m tonnes food grains
The government targets over 44.1 million tonnes of rice and wheat in 2025–26, supported by strong Aman, Aus, and Boro output and expanded vegetable, maize, and oilseed production. Rabi goals include 1.22 million tonnes of wheat. To reinforce stocks, authorities plan additional rice and wheat imports and expanded storage capacity.
The government has set a target to produce over 44.10 million tonnes of rice and wheat during the summer and winter season in the 2025-26 fiscal year.
Along with the rice production, the government also has fixed targets to produce other crops, including summer and winter vegetables, maize, jute, pulses, sweet potato, different types of edible oil, onion and various kinds of spices like garlic, dry chilli, coriander and black cumin.
Under the rice production target, over 18.10 million tonnes of Aman rice are expected to be produced on more than 5.90 million hectares across the country, according to the latest report compiled by the Department of Agricultural Extension (DAE) last week, reports BSS.
The hybrid Aman will be produced around 1.75 million tonnes, the high-yielding variety (HYV) is 15.10 million tonnes, the local variety 0.97 million tonnes, and broadcast or deep water Aman is around 0.33 million tonnes, the DAE reports show.
Regarding the achievement of the Aman production target, M Obaidur Rahman Mondol, director of Field Service Wing (FSW), DAE, said, “Around 20 per cent harvest so far has been completed, and the total harvest will be completed by the first week of December. We hope that we will be able to achieve 100 per cent production target.”
For the Aus production, the DAE report mentioned that the country has achieved 2.99 million tonnes of Aus rice against the production target of 3.22 million tonnes.
According to the report, the highest Aus rice production came from the HYV variety at 2.71 million tonnes, with 0.20 million tonnes from the hybrid variety and 77,000 tonnes from the local variety
Under the Boro rice, the government has set a target to produce 22.70 million tonnes of Boro rice during the winter season, where 7.68 million tonnes come from the hybrid variety, 15.0 million tonnes from the HYVs, and 21,800 tonnes will be the local variety.
Besides, the country has produced nearly 7.10 million tonnes of vegetables, 0.82 million tonnes of summer maize, 87500 tonnes of sesame, 15600 tonnes of summer peanuts, 17800 tonnes of summer mung, 0.32 million tonnes of green chilli and 44300 tonnes of dry chilli under the Kharif-1 season, typically running from mid-March to mid-July.
Moreover, the country has produced around 2.36 million tonnes of vegetables, 100 tonnes black gram (maskalai dal), 500 tonnes onion, 15,640 tonnes green chilli, 5618 tonnes dry chilli, 27000 tonnes cucumber and 100 tonnes watermelon during Kharif-2 (autumn season), the second part of the larger Kharif cropping season, lasting roughly from mid-July to mid-November.
In the upcoming Rabi or winter cropping season in South Asia, typically running from mid-November to April-May, the government has set a target to produce 1.22 million tonnes of wheat on 0.31 million hectares of land across the country.
A target has been set to produce 6.21 million tonnes of maize, 0.72 million tonnes of sweet potato, 14.90 million tonnes of vegetables, over 11.30 million tonnes of potatoes, 2400 tonnes of chick pea, 0.27 million tonnes mung, 0.22 million tonnes Indian pea (Khesari dal), 0.16 million tonnes red lentil, 0.19 million tonnes peanuts, 1.75 million tonnes mustard, 2300 tonnes sesame, 0.20 million tonnes soyabean, 24300 tonnes sunflower and 800 tonnes linseed (tishi) during the winter season.
Apart from this, a target has been fixed to produce over 4.20 million tonnes of onion, 0.82 million tonnes of garlic, 0.24 million tonnes of dry chilli, 68900 tonnes of coriander and 12700 tonnes of black seed during the Rabi season.
In 2025-26, the country also produced a total of 8.03 million bales of Jute, which includes local, tosha, mesta and kenaf varieties. The highest jute production of 7.42 million bales occurred from the Tosha jute as the variety renowned for its silky texture and fine fibres.
Along with the internal production, the government plans to import an extra 0.50 million tonnes of rice and 0.40 million tonnes of wheat by December to bolster the stock further, said food secretary Mohammad Masudul Hasan.
To overcome any further food shortage, he said, “the food department remains alert to increase buffer stock of food through internal and external procurement as the department has not faced any failure in the last 53 years after the independence of the country.”
“Along with upcoming Aman procurement, we have prior approval from the purchase committee led by the Advisers’ Council for food grain procurement and also have signed five-year-long G2G (government to government) contracts with Myanmar, Vietnam, Pakistan and the USA to import rice and wheat,” he explained.
“The amount of paddy and rice that has been procured so far is the highest in the country’s history. This has been made possible due to the government’s prior planning regarding food security,” said Md Moniruzzaman, Procurement Division Director of the directorate.
According to the Ministry of Food, the government’s food grain storage capacity has also increased to 2.38 million tonnes in the current fiscal year following the completion of four modern silos in Madhupur, Barishal, Mymensingh, and Narayanganj.
Officials from the ministry further said ensuring food for around 18 crore people has become a major challenge for the government, as the amount of arable land for food grain cultivation continues to shrink.
Ministry sources also said that seven silo warehouses are currently under construction across the country, each with a storage capacity of around 50,000 tonnes of food grain.
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Source : The Financial Express
