The New Nation - Internet Edition

Staff Reporter

Bangladesh will conduct an assessment on Chinese and Thai contract farming practices at Myanmar to introduce it in case of Bangladesh, official sources said.

A high-powered Bangladeshi delegation comprising Agriculture Ministry and Foreign Ministry officials will visit Myanmar next month to see how China and Thailand are doing contract farming there.

Myanmar proposed to Bangladesh to take lease of at least 50,000 acres of land in its Rakhine state for 'contract farming' during the first annual consultation between the two countries, held in Myanmar on May 19 to 20, 2007. The Myanmar authority further restated their proposal in a Dhaka-Yangon bilateral talks held in Dhaka this year.

Bangladesh responded to Myanmar's proposal positively and is willing to sign a deal in this connection after conducting feasibility assessment within this year, a high official of the Foreign Ministry said. "We are hopeful that around 10,000 Bangladeshi farmers mostly from Chittagong region could be employed if the country accepted Myanmar's proposal," the official said preferring anonymity.

He said Bangladeshi farmers have innovative knowledge on farming and they will be able to bring a huge expense of Myanmar land under contract farming in future. This will help Bangladesh to ease food crisis that it is facing these days.

Chairman of Bangladesh-Myanmar business promotion council Syed Mahmudul Huq told newsmen that Bangladeshi farmers may primarily concentrate on producing three types of agricultural products-paddy, pulse and maize-under contract farming in Myanmar.

Bangladesh is also considering updating the existing border trade rules with Myanmar to expand the border trade with the neighbouring country.

The government decided to increase border trade from current US$ 10,000 to US$ 20,000. The decision was taken at a meeting of the inter-ministerial sub-committee on Bangladesh-Myanmar trade. Commerce Secretary Feroz Ahmed presided over the meeting held at the Commerce Ministry conference room recently.

Bangladesh Bank has already agreed to allow enhancement of the border trade to facilitate import of more essential commodities like rice and pulses.

The meeting also decided to take initiative so that the infrastructure of border trade could be shifted from Teknaf to Chittagong.

"Myanmar has the potential - because of its climate, topography, soil conditions, rainfall, waterways, agricultural land resources, fishery resources and human resources - to produce an extensive variety of competitively priced agricultural, livestock and fishery products," a high official of the Commerce Ministry said.