The country’s one and only Regional Horticulture Research Station (RHRS) in Chapainawabganj, dedicated for research of mangoes, is not yet up to the standard it was envisioned to be 30 years after its establishment.
According to the authority, the RHRS does not have the necessary manpower, advanced laboratory facilities; it needs proper planning and initiative to become a proper research station.
The 110-bigha RHRS has hundred of varities of mango trees for research. But the researchers claim that lack of better facilities and manpower are hindering development.
After Bangladesh’s liberation, production of mango was falling for various reasons. To save the mango production from infestation of insects, in 1985 the Mango Research Centre was set up in the mango capital Chapainawabganj. Later it was renamed to RHRS in 1990.
The RHRS did not only save mango production from infestation, it also developed eight new classes of mango. Of these, four were distributed in 2009.
According to RHRS sources, the station is supposed to have 19 researchers but currently there are only eight. And one of them is currently dispatched elsewhere. The other research station personnel are comprised of 15 workers, 27 labours, and 10 Ansars for security. It also has living quarters for the officers and staff, but many are unused. There are three research labs, but all are traditional.
Researchers of the station opined that Bangladesh is missing out on mango exports because of lack of research facilities. They said the new classes of mangoes are in great demand, but without a tissue culture laboratory seedlings cannot be developed and distributed.
On the other hand, lack of a molecular laboratory has resulted in no success in DNA and hybrid identification. The research centre has a team of researchers with doctorate degrees who are motivated and willing to discover something new. But they claim lack of facilities are hindering everything.
On top of that, traditional facilities mean everything takes a long time and it is difficult to maintain quality standards, said the station’s Senior Research Officer Ashraful Alam. He said: “We are far behind the developed world. Being a poor country we do not have a lot of the facilities.”
However, the station’s Chied Scientific Officer Dr Md Shafiqul Islam claimed the RHRS, despite its drawbacks, have played a very good assisting role in the development of mango production.
He said the RHRS would be able to contribute better if the station was given the appropriate manpower and facilities it needs.