DHAKA, May 28, 2024 (BSS)- Thirty-nine-year-old Ramiza became helpless when her husband, only earning member of her family fell into sick and paralyzed in 2018. She was thinking what to do to run her five-member family as they sold their property-land to bear the expenses of her husband’s treatment.
  
One day, a field officer of a local NGO visited her house. Ramiza told her about the situation. The officer suggested her to do something like lemon farming in high land areas as many get success in lemon farming in Monohardi, Belabo, Shibpur and Raipura upazilas of the Narsingdi district in the last ten years.
  
After taking some training from the NGO, Ramiza started lemon farming in Belabo upazila. In the beginning, she took lease some land for two years from a local farmer. She started lemon farming on small scale on experimental basis. 
 
The Department of Agriculture Extension (DAE) took a programme to make farmers to cultivate export quality lemon in four upazilas after seeing the interest of the farmers and finding climate and soil of the district suitable for Colombo lemon cultivation. 
 
Under the programme, a total of 50 new orchards of Colombo lemon (each orchard spread one bigha) were set up in the four upazilas of the district. 
 
The DAE supplied 160 sapling of Colombo lemon to each grower of the orchards and imparted them training on producing quality lemon. 
 
Besides some farmers in different areas of the district raised a number of orchards by their own initiative and they are, at present, harvesting good quality lemon from their orchards.
  
According to DAE Narsingdi, farmers in four upazilas currently are cultivating Colombo lemon in 2200 orchards on 480 hectares of land. This year, they have so far produced over 5200 tonnes of lemon in the district.
  
Ramiza said she succeeded in Colombo lemon cultivation and gradually raised a garden by planting 1000 saplings on 150 decimals of land. This year, she got an excellent outcome from his garden.
  
She expressed satisfaction for earning Taka 300000 by now by selling the lemon this season.
Like Ramiza, many women of these upazila are cultivating Colombo lemon. 
 
DAE deputy director Shovan Kumar Dhar said Colombo lemon has great demand in the local and neighborhood markets as it is being exported abroad specially European and Middle East countries. 
 
Dhar said April, May and June are the best time for harvesting Colombo lemon, expressing that, this year Narsingdi district will export over 2000 metric tons of Calombo lemon abroad.