Rice cultivation || Honor the hard work of farmers

Hello friends,

Hope you all are well and started a fresh working day after an enjoyable holiday.

I am here today to write about rice cultivation. Although I am not an agronomist, I will try to describe rice cultivation process what I have seen in my last visit to my hometown. I will also try to highlight about the hard work of our farmers.

Farmers play an important role by producing foods for us and maintain the balance of the world. Without food, we cannot survive a single day. They are the farmers who produce it for us. Therefore, farmers are the key players of our society.

Approximately, 71 percent of the earth's surface is water-covered. Remaining 29 present is land. Agriculture occupies one-third of this 29 percent land. This statistics shows how much we are dependent on our agriculture sector.

Rice cultivation is one of the major sectors of our agriculture. Rice is the staple food of many countries. Therefore, a vast amount of land is used for rice cultivation all around the world. I was listening in a TV program that rice is cultivated more than 100 countries of the world which occupies approximately 165 million hectors of land. From this much of land, we get approximately 800 million tons of rice. If we consider the region, Asia is the major contributor of entire rice production. Approximately 90% of rice is produced in this region.

However, the full process of rice production is a hardworking job. I spent few hours with the farmers and observed the process closely. I shall try to describe the whole process with few pictures.

Seed selection:

The first job of a farmer is to select good quality seed to get the best crop. Good quality seed is available in the market. Farmers can buy it from there.

Seedbed preparation:

After getting good seed, the job is to prepare the seedbed. In the seedbed, seeds are placed. After few days, the seed starts to grow. When the size become 6-7 inch, the seedlings are ready to transfer to the main land. Here are the seedlings pictures. Farmers are gathering seedlings from seedbed.

Land preparation:

Now, the farmer will prepare the main land for rice cultivation. Firstly, the land need to be transferred to the best physical condition. Land preparation includes digging, breaking the hard soil, mix and level the soil. There are two process to do this job. One is manual and another is automated. Earlier, the manual process was used to prepare the land. Now, the automated process has taken over it. Tractor is used for land preparation which is easy and fast. Then water is required to make the land wet. Now, the land is fully prepared.

Seedlings transplanting:

Now the time is to transfer the seedling to the mail land from seedbed. Seedlings can be transplanted either manually or by a machine. Nevertheless, in Bangladesh region, people prefer to transplant it by hands. Here are some pictures of transplantation of seedling in the land.

Water management:

This is the most important part to grow crops well and healthy. Continuous flow of water is required in the field to keep the crops green. In early days people used to pull water manually. Now, automated pump is used to water the crops.

Use of fertilizer and pesticides:

Different fertilizers are used for better growth of crops. There are specific types of fertilizer for specific crops. Pesticides are also used to protect crops from unwanted insects. We have to remember that pesticides are harmful for health. Nevertheless, it is recommended to use biological pesticides.

Weed management:

Weed management is another important part to get good crops. Unwanted weed make obstacle for crop growth. The farmers should remove the unwanted weeds from the land.

Harvest:

Now the time is to harvest the crops. When the rice plant turned into golden color, the farmers understand that they need to cut the crops and bring back to home. This is the moment of joy for them.

However, it is really a hardworking job to cultivate rice. They work whole day in the field burning under the sun. I spent few hour with them and felt uncomfortable and thirsty although I did nothing but taking few pictures.

Last but not the least, the farmers are not getting proper reward compared to the hard work they do. They are getting very much low price for producing the crops. The broker or intermediaries are taking the benefits. The government should look after this and save the farmers. We should acknowledge and respect their hard work.

Here all the pictures were captured using my iPhone 11 pro max mobile phone. Thanks for stopping by.