Soybean farming has started for the first time on experimental basis at the barind tract in Rajshahi.
Shariful Islam, farmer of Kodomshahar under Godagari upazila of the district, came up with the initiative and this year, he has been cultivating the cash crop on 2.676 hectares (20 bighas) of land with supervision of Barind Centre of On-Farm Research Division of Bangladesh Agriculture Research Institute (BARI).
“We have provided seeds of BARI Soybean variety along with other farming technologies and strategies to him. We are expecting yield of four to five maunds from per bigha of land,” said Saifuzzaman, scientific assistant of the centre.
Market price of the crop would be Tk3,000 to 3,500 per maund, he added.
He said soybean farming needed minimum use of fertiliser and insecticides, and irrigation was also not needed which would give a scope of more profit in less cost in water-stress condition.
Al Mahmud, another scientific officer, said they had expected the farmer to be benefited more through such farming than other crops.
In future, farming of soybean would be more familiar alongside other crops as other farmers were likely to come forward towards this farming, he added.
He said there was an enormous prospect of expansion of soybean farming in the barind tract comprising the districts of Rajshahi, Chapainawabganj and Naogaon.