Farmers from across the country will sell watermelons at five places in the capital with the slogan “farmer's product, farmer's price” starting today.
The initiative taken by the Bangladesh Agri Farmers Association (Bafa) will continue till 27 Ramadan, according to a press release issued by the association on Wednesday.
The release, signed by Bafa President AKM Najib Ullah, said watermelons will be sold directly by farmers at five points of the capital initially. Later, the initiative will be expanded to other areas.
The initial five spots are Bangabandhu Chattar in Khamarbari, Zamzam Tower in Uttara Sector 11, Abdul Gani Road near the Secretariat, Japan Garden City in Mohammadpur, and Nayabazar in Old Dhaka.
Watermelon weighing more than 5kg will be sold at Tk100 per piece, while those exceeding 7kg will be sold at Tk150, the press release said. Those weighing more than 9kg will be sold at Tk200, and those weighing over 11kg will be available to customers at Tk250, it added.
The release also said that farmers are not getting a fair price for their produce despite huge demand for the fruit across the country. At the same time, customers are paying a high price for watermelons. In such a situation, Bafa has taken this initiative to facilitate farmers selling watermelons directly to customers. Bafa hopes that, through this initiative, they will be able to reduce the dominance of middlemen in the watermelon market and enable customers to buy the fruit variety at a fair price as well.