Mohammad Shakil spent between 18 and 20 taka to produce each kilogram of potatoes on his four bighas of farmland in Bogura’s Shibganj upazila. By the time he paid for cold storage, sacks and transportation, the cost had risen to about 30 taka.
He is now selling those potatoes for 13 taka a kilogram.
Shakil stored 75 sacks, each weighing 65 kilograms, hoping prices would improve later in the year. He has sold about 25 sacks. The remaining 50 are still in storage, with little prospect of recovering his investment.
At the beginning of the season, potatoes fetched just 10 taka a kilogram. Shakil waited for a recovery that never came.
“What can I do? I had to sell at a loss,” he told Daily Waadaa. “I thought prices might rise towards the end of the season, but now I am facing losses on the entire crop.”
It is the second consecutive year that Shakil has sold potatoes for less than half his total costs.
“I cannot even recover half my costs,” he said. “I have not yet decided whether to cultivate potatoes this year. Farmers cannot continue in agriculture if they keep suffering losses like this.”
Across Bangladesh’s potato-growing districts, farmers and traders are confronting a similar problem. Potatoes are selling for 10–13 taka a kilogram at cold storage facilities, against production and storage costs of 25–30 taka for many growers.
Yet consumers are paying 25–30 taka a kilogram at retail markets.
The gap reflects a market struggling to absorb more potatoes than the country consumes, with farmers bearing much of the financial burden.
Bangladesh produced 11.272 million tonnes of potatoes in the latest fiscal year, according to the Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics, compared with 11.573 million tonnes the previous year.
Production fell by about 301,000 tonnes, or 2.6%. But the country still grew substantially more potatoes than it needed.
Annual domestic demand is estimated at nine million tonnes, leaving a production surplus of approximately 2.27 million tonnes, equivalent to about 25% of domestic consumption.
The surplus has accumulated in cold storage facilities across the country.
According to the Bangladesh Cold Storage Association, Bangladesh has approximately 351 operational cold storage facilities with a combined capacity of 4.5 million tonnes. Owners estimate that about 1.4 million tonnes of potatoes remain in storage.
Normally, much more of that stock would have reached the market by this point in the year. Instead, weak demand and falling prices have discouraged farmers and traders from releasing their potatoes.
Mostafa Azad Chowdhury Babu, president of the association, said the government had failed to develop an effective mechanism to manage the surplus.
“Farmers have been losing their capital for the past two years,” he told Waadaa. “We have repeatedly informed the government about the issue, but no effective initiative has been taken.”
The price differences along the supply chain are substantial.
Department of Agricultural Marketing figures put wholesale prices at 13–18 taka a kilogram and retail prices at 25–30 taka. At cold storage gates, however, farmers and traders report receiving as little as 10 taka.
The difference between storage-gate and retail prices can reach 20 taka a kilogram, so each kilogram sold brings another set of losses.
In Naogaon, potato trader Uttam Kumar Dey invested about 10 lakh taka in potatoes this year, using a bank loan to finance the purchase.
He bought potatoes for around 10–11 taka a kilogram and stored them in Bogura, expecting to earn a modest profit when prices improved.
Instead, storage fees and other expenses raised his total cost to 22 taka a kilogram. He is now selling for 10–11 taka, losing roughly half his investment on each kilogram sold.
“I stored potatoes this year hoping to make a profit of 2 taka per kg,” he said. “But forget about making a profit; I am worried whether I will even recover the storage fees.”
The bank loan remains outstanding.
“Now, I see no way to repay the loan other than selling my father's land,” he said.
The losses have also reached farmers who have spent decades cultivating potatoes.
Golam Mostafa, from Naogaon Sadar, has grown potatoes on about four bighas for 20 years. His annual harvest averages 260–280 maunds.
At the beginning of the season, he sold part of his crop for 8–9 taka a kilogram. He stored the remainder, expecting better prices later.
They never arrived. Mostafa said he had also lost money growing onions, leaving him with few alternatives.
“We have no other source of income,” he told Waadaa. “We are compelled to grow potatoes and onions because no other crops do well on our land.”
With prices still depressed, he is reluctant even to pay for a truck to collect his remaining potatoes from storage.
“The government should tell us what crops we should grow instead of potatoes,” he said.
His concerns extend beyond the current harvest. Household expenses are rising, debts remain unpaid and another planting season is approaching.
The financial pressure is spreading through the potato trade.
Mahbub Alam, manager of Khondaker Cold Storage in Bogura, said potatoes were selling for 10–12 taka a kilogram at the storage gate, while storage fees alone amounted to 6 taka.
That leaves just 4–6 taka a kilogram after storage charges, before accounting for cultivation, packaging and transportation.
Traders have consequently become reluctant to buy, even at sharply reduced prices.
The downturn has extended beyond farmers and traders to the businesses that preserve their crops.
At RB Cold Storage in Joypurhat’s Kalai upazila, owner Parimal Prasad Raj said only half the stored potatoes had been released this year. By the same point in a normal season, the figure would have reached about 70%.
The facility has a capacity of 12,000 tonnes.
Parimal told Waadaa that traders had suffered heavy losses for two consecutive years, leaving some at risk of losing their entire working capital.
In Bogura, Khondaker Cold Storage owner Muhammad Shahadat Hossain Saju described an even more severe situation.
Last year, 15,000 sacks remained unsold at his facility. Some depositors never returned to collect their potatoes because the market price was too low to justify the expense.
Large quantities remain unsold this year.
Saju, who also grows potatoes on 100 bighas of land, said he had about 15,000 sacks still in cold storage.
“At these prices, we will not even recover half our costs,” he said.
The Bangladesh Cold Storage Association estimates that more than 40 storage facilities have closed over the past two years.
Its president, Mostafa Azad Chowdhury Babu, attributed the closures to mounting debt, higher electricity bills, inflation and rising operating expenses, compounded by the collapse in potato prices.
In September, storage charges were reduced by 0.75 taka a kilogram in an attempt to ease the burden on farmers.
The association says the measure failed to deliver the intended benefit.
Instead, Babu told Waadaa, intermediaries used the lower storage charges to negotiate further price reductions, with potato prices falling by another 3–4 taka a kilogram.
The association estimates that the fee reduction could cost cold storage operators about 1.72 billion taka.
“If farmers had benefited from the reduction, that would have been one thing,” Babu said.
The Department of Agricultural Extension acknowledges that excessive supply is a central problem.
Sohel Md Shamsuddin Firoz, deputy director of the department in Bogura, said increased production had placed downward pressure on prices.
The authorities are considering measures to reduce the area under potato cultivation and encourage farmers to grow mustard instead.
They also plan to promote potato cultivation using fewer fertilisers and pesticides, with the aim of improving access to export markets.
But these proposals do not immediately address the estimated 1.4 million tonnes of potatoes still held in storage, or the loans farmers and traders must repay.
For producers, the next planting season presents a difficult decision. Continuing to grow potatoes risks another year of losses. Switching crops requires suitable land, investment and reliable buyers.
Babu warned that two years of losses had already depleted the capital of many farmers and traders. If prices remain below costs, some may be unable or unwilling to finance another crop.
Shakil, the Bogura farmer, has yet to decide whether to plant potatoes again.
After two seasons of selling below cost, he is still trying to recover what he can from the last harvest.
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Additional reporting by Samin Rayan