A modern steel silo is being built on the Bhairab bank in Khulna.

Md. Shamim Hossain – Khulna A modern food storage or steel silo is being constructed on the banks of Bhairab river in Khulna for storing wheat. The World Bank is financing the silo under construction on an area of 7.44 acres inside the Maheswarpasha CSD of Daulatpur Police Station of the city. Under the food preservation construction project under the implementation of the Food Directorate, the construction cost of the silo has been estimated at 355 crore 91 lakhs. The project started in January 2022 and will be completed on December 11, 2024. The contractor has already claimed that 35 percent of the project has been completed. Md. Mazedur Rahman, engineer in charge of project supervision, told Khulna Gazette that the latest wheat steel silo is being constructed to store loose wheat. The silo will have 6 cylindrical bins. Each bin will have a capacity of 12,700 metric tons. Accordingly, 76 thousand 2 hundred metric tons of loose wheat can be stored when the construction of this modern food storage is completed. The quality of wheat kept here without chemicals will be good for three years. Only by controlling the air-conditioning system will the temperature of the wheat be kept correct. When the wheat is transported by river, road or rail, the wheat will come to the warehouse automatically through the conveyor belt and be stored in each bin. The loose wheat will then be distributed to different districts from storage through auto packaging system. He also said that this is a pilot project. 8 such modern food storage or steel silos are being constructed in eight regions of the country. Of these, 6 are steel silos for rice and the remaining 2 are steel silos for wheat. Construction of 3 steel silos nearing completion. 4 are in progress. Another 1 construction work tender is under process. The engineer added that the government has plans to build such a modern food storage facility in every district of the country after the piloting project is completed. A French private company called “Jericho France” is the designer of the state-of-the-art steel silo and they are mainly supervising the work as a consultant. Those concerned said that the objective of the project is to increase the strategic food storage capacity at the government level, to protect food security through the storage of food grains and seeds. Distribution of household silos at the household level to meet post-disaster needs, development of food storage systems in the country, reduction of food storage costs and introduction of improved food storage management and monitoring.