Reaz Ahmad, back from Khagrachhari
Loss in per capita land availability and the policies of the government have made it difficult for people of Khagrachhari to keep alive the tradition of jhum cultivation-- the slash-and-burn method of hill farming.
With the plainland immigrants having the upper-hand in getting leases of plots in the upland and the government itself booking some of the more fertile tracts for orchards and tree plantations, local cultivators find it difficult to get enough farm produces from the shrunken areas under slash-and-burn farming.
Official statistics show population in Khagrachhari rose to 5.25 lakh in 2002 from 3.25 lakh in 1992. On the other hand, land area under slash-and-burn declined from 20,000 hectares to 15,000 hectares over the last five years.
Slash-and-burn remains ecologically harmonious only when the population density is low. It requires a lot of land since farmers must move on to newer hills after a season of cultivation. When there are too many farmers, they cannot maintain the system of crop rotation.
In this method, bushes and weeds in hills are slashed and burnt. Crops are grown for a season on the cleared ground, fertilised by the ash and by the accumulated humus. Although it is often blamed for forest destruction and soil erosion, the traditional system is a stable one that allows plenty of time for forests to regenerate.
After harvesting a season's crop, the Jhumiyas (shifting farmers) move to the next hill giving the earlier hill a resting period of five to seven years.
Talking to a group of journalists on Saturday last, Jhumiyas in Khagrachhari said that due to loss in per capita land availability, they could no longer afford to keep the lands in the hills fallow for five years. They have to return to the same hill every alternate year.
"With the population growth, slash-and-burn has become much more intensive, and much less sustainable. Cultivated areas are larger, and fallow periods are shorter. The result is permanent deforestation, and widespread soil erosion," said a report prepared by the Taiwan-based Food & Fertiliser Technology Centre (FFTC). "The situation today in slash-and-burn areas of upland Bangladesh is typical of much of Asia's slopelands. The fallow period has fallen to only three to four years, which is not enough to restore soil fertility. Crop yields are falling, leading to even greater pressure on land and more environmental destruction," the FFTC report added.
Indigenous farming communities living in the three hill districts Khagrachhari, Rangamati and Bandarban grow vegetables, maize and spices along with rice. The seeds of paddy, cucumber, turmeric and ginger are put together and sown in on the same hill patch. The slash-and-burn method gives the growers relief from fatiguing cultivation of different crops at different times.
Nayanjyoti Roaza is a Jhumiya who has less than one hectare of land in Alutilla, a hilly range, in Khagrachhari. Roaza said in the past they could give the hills five to seven years of respite before slashing and burning the bushes again for fresh cultivation. But now they have to rotate the hills every alternate year owing to the pressure of population growth.
"In the past, bushes and trees used to grow in the hills owing to long gaps and once we burnt them, the land became ready for fresh cultivation. But now as there is almost no vegetation (due to short fallow period), we've to apply weedicide to destroy the tiny weeds," Roaza said.
Another Jhumiya of Alutilla range, Rabindra Tripura, said that government took some upland areas for development of orchards and tree plantations.
Amarendra Tripura, also a Jhumiya, said generally they get 800 to 900 kilograms of rice from every acre of jhum land. Besides, they also harvest vegetables and spices from the same land.
The Deputy Director of the Department of Agriculture Extension at Khagrachhari, AK Azad, acknowledged the fall in acreage under slash-and-burn, and attributed this to leasing of more lands to well off settlers from plainland.
He said, "To augment the productivity of shifting farmers, we're trying to supply high yielding varieties to them."
"We advise them to go for jhum a year in a particular hill and then grow fruits and timber trees in rotation. But as hills people have no permanent land ownership, they're less interested in growing longer-duration plants," explained Azad.
Azad is of the view that jhum cultivation should remain intact as a rich tradition of the indigenous people but at the same time the shifting farmers must be aware of soil erosion and deforestation.
Prof Amena Mohsin Of Dhaka university in a study on the lives of hill-people said, "The hills people began to lose their rights when the British colonial rulers arrived in the region. They denounced the slash-and-burn mode of cultivation as 'primitive'.
The fallow periods were considered uneconomic and the plough was introduced instead."