Agriculture Minister Dr Md Abdur Razzaque on Friday urged Japanese company Yanmar to set up a factory in Bangladesh to manufacture machinery used in agriculture locally.

Razzaque said Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina is giving huge subsidies for agricultural machinery to accelerate agricultural mechanisation in Bangladesh.

“As a result, the interest of farmers in the use of machinery in agriculture has increased and a huge market for agricultural machinery has been created,” he added.

The agriculture minister said this to Japanese Ambassador to Bangladesh Ito Naoki while visiting an exhibition on such equipment and machinery by Yanmar, at the Deepto Television premises in Dhaka.

Yanmar is a Japanese diesel engine, heavy machinery and agricultural machinery manufacturer founded in Osaka, Japan in 1912. 

Razzaque specifically said Yanmar can make agricultural equipment locally in Bangladesh as there is demand for their equipment.

Meanwhile, Japanese Ambassador Ito Naoki said that an initiative for a joint venture with Bangladesh will be taken up to develop agricultural machinery in the country.

For the time being, being self-reliant in food production, the country’s challenge is to ensure adequate nutrition for all.

Although Japan is an industrially developed country, they attach the utmost importance to agricultural production so that they do not have to depend on others for food, said Razzaque.

“We too cannot depend on others for food. That is why the present government is stressing support for agriculture.”