Agriculture Reference
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wheat production in 2008/09 was attributed to farmers being encouraged by a record rise in
wheat prices, thus providing an incentive to plant the golden crop worldwide in 2008/09
(Allen, 2008).
V
ariables
Growth rates
1961 - 1970 1971 - 1980 1981 - 1990 1991 - 2000 2001 - 2008 1961 - 2008
Area 0.006*
0.012*** -0.006** -0.001 0.005
0.000
Production 0.040***
0.030*** 0.021*** 0.011** 0.016**
0.021***
Yield 0.034***
0.018*** 0.027*** 0.011*** 0.011**
0.020***
Export 0.013
0.044*** 0.006 -0.002 0.012**
0.019***
Note: Growth rates are estimated using semi-log trend function:
lnY =
α
+
β
T
, where
T
denotes time
and β is the growth rate.
*** significant at 1 % level (p<0.01)
** significant at 5 % level (p<0.05)
* significant at 10 % level (p<0.10)
Source: Computed from the data provided by USDA (2008): Foreign Agricultural Service, Production,
Supply, and Distribution Database.
Figure 1. Trends in area, production, yield and export of wheat in the world during the period 1961 -
2008.
Bangladesh, traditionally a food deficit country dominated by rice production, also
depended on wheat imports since independence in 1971 which continued well into the late
1980s. This injection of wheat through imports gradually resulted in a change in dietary
habits. As a result, wheat consumption became an important supplement of rice. Also, wheat
acreage now ranks second after rice area. Figure 2 presents the trends in wheat area,
production, yield and imports over the past four decades (1971-2006) in Bangladesh. In
general, the trends are not as smooth as observed in the world level. The wheat area increased
steadily from only 125.6 thousand ha to 832.4 thousand ha in 2000 and then started to decline
sharply reaching only 479.1 thousand ha in 2006. Similarly, wheat production increased
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