Cyclone Mocha: DAE tells farmers to harvest paddy, mangoes

Fearing damage to corps, farmers in Rajshahi are rushing to harvest paddy and mangoes as Cyclone Mocha approaches the country.

The cyclone, which is expected to make landfall on Sunday, is expected to bring strong winds and heavy rains from Saturday evening.

In the meantime, the Department of Agricultural Extension directed mango and paddy farmers to harvest all their produce despite 20 percent of the corps are not ready for harvesting.

As a result, the farmers are working around the clock to harvest their mangoes and paddy.

"We are worried about the storm as it turned into a strong cyclone," said farmer Alfaz Hossain of Paikpara of Paba upazila today.

Alfaz said he is harvesting paddy which needed another two weeks to be harvest-ready.

However, a rise in temperature rose in this week has helped to ripen paddy fast, he said.

Last year, he got 18 to 20 maunds per bigha yield of paddy, and he hopes the yield will be between 22 and 25 maund per bigha this year.

At Raipara of Rajshahi city, Mazed Ali was harvesting his mangoes on Thursday.

He said the Kancha Mitha variety of mango lose it value when it is ripened, and so he was harvesting those ahead of the cyclone.

However, he would not harvest other varieties until those are ripened.

Anwarul Haque, a mango producer said, farmers don't usually worry about nor'westers or any kind of storms as the damage from those are minimal. But hailstorms and cyclones like Mocha can heavily damage their orchards.

He said green mangoes of Gopalbhog, Himsagar, Khirsapat, Langra varieties would not sell in the markets.

"We have been through storms before," said Hoque, hoping to survive this too.