Government to Give Farmer Cards to 24 Million Farmers in Four Years, 4.3 Million Targeted This Fiscal Year

The BNP government led by Prime Minister Tarique Rahman is implementing a large-scale programme to register farmers, deliver agricultural input support and gradually distribute farmer cards nationwide. A target has been set to bring around 24 million farmers under the programme over the next four years.

Work is under way to bring 4.3 million farmers under the farmer card programme in the current 2026-27 fiscal year. The plan is to implement the programme centred on 14,180 agriculture blocks in 503 upazilas across all 64 districts.

Through the farmer card programme, an integrated database of farmers is being built and financial and agricultural input support is being delivered to them. In the initial phase, landless, marginal and small farmers are being given special priority.

Data collection, bank account opening, and card distribution and input support through pre-piloting are already under way. According to the programme's information, progress has been made in 1,681 agriculture blocks in 503 upazilas of the 64 districts, with data collected from 1.925 million farmers so far. Alongside this, 900,000 bank accounts linked to the farmer card have been opened.

Pre-piloting was carried out from March to June this year to test the implementation process and run initial activities. In that phase, farmer cards were distributed among 20,832 farmers in 11 agriculture blocks of 11 upazilas in 10 districts across the eight divisions.

The pre-pilot distribution was formally inaugurated on 14 April 2026, the first day of the Bangla New Year, in Tangail Sadar upazila. The programme was then implemented in the designated areas.

Under the pre-pilot, financial incentives were given to 20,480 landless, marginal and small farmers. At Tk 2,500 per person per year, a total of Tk 51.2 million was distributed in that phase.

Building on the pre-pilot experience, the programme is now being expanded over a wider area. On 1 October, activities were inaugurated simultaneously in 77 upazilas of 56 districts. One agriculture block was selected from each upazila in this phase, bringing a total of 77 blocks under the programme.

A total of 110,165 farmers are being brought under the programme in this phase, including 7,643 farmers in six upazilas of Feni district. Alongside the expansion of the farmer card programme in the selected areas, agricultural input support is also planned.

According to programme information, 100,047 farmers are covered by input support in this phase — 7,153 in Feni's six upazilas and 92,894 in the remaining 55 districts. Landless, marginal and small farmers are being prioritised for this support as well.

The programme is being expanded in phases rather than rolled out in every agriculture block at once. Initially, 7,643 farmer cards will be distributed among farmers in six agriculture blocks in Feni's six upazilas.

At field level, a key role in implementing the programme is being played by the Programme on Agricultural and Rural Transformation for Nutrition, Entrepreneurship and Resilience in Bangladesh (PARTNER) project.

The project's deputy programme director, Md Rakibuzzaman Khan, told the state news agency BSS that initial data collection is under way to gather accurate information on farmers, assess their needs and support the modernisation of agriculture. He said farmers' needs change with the seasons, which poses some challenges, but once a reliable database is built it will be easier to provide training, modern agricultural technology, productivity growth and support for agricultural entrepreneurs according to their needs.

Rakibuzzaman Khan also said data on 22,000 farmers has already been collected, and that coordinating the farmer card programme's data and activities will make it possible to bring farmers under various agricultural services and increase the effectiveness of government initiatives at field level.

Md Yeasin, additional secretary of the Agriculture Ministry's farmer card cell, told BSS the programme's main goal is to preserve accurate information on farmers and make the process of delivering government support to them easier and more effective. Data collection, verification, bank account opening and phased card distribution are therefore being advanced in a coordinated way, he said.

Agriculture Secretary Md Selim Khan told BSS the farmer card programme is an important initiative to bring the country's farmers under an integrated database. It will make it possible to identify genuine farmers, deliver agricultural inputs and financial support according to their needs, and run agricultural services in a more orderly way, he said.

He added: “Our agriculture- and farmer-friendly prime minister has introduced the ‘farmer card’ for farmers' welfare. Under the prime minister's directives, farmer cards will be provided to 24 million farmers within the next four years.”

Md Selim Khan said farmers will receive 10 services through the card, including low-interest agricultural loans, irrigation, fertiliser, seed, incentives, crop insurance, weather information and pest-control advice. In his words, the farmer card reflects the respect farmers deserve and the fact that the government and the state stand beside them.