Favourable weather conditions have helped farmers to cross the government’s target in the amount of land that it wanted placed under Aman cultivation during the current year, Department of Agriculture Extension officials claim. The department has estimated that farmers have cultivated Aman in about 58 lakh hectares of land, almost 2 lakh hectares beyond the target of 56.03 lakh hectare for the current 2013-14 crop year. The production target has been set at 132.76 lakh tonnes, officials at the DAE field service wing said. DAE officials said that adequate level of rainfall, absence of natural calamities including flash flood and drought, use of balanced fertilizer and introduction of high yielding verities including BINA-7, BRRI Dhan-49 have helped to boost the production of Aman. According to Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics, some 128.97 lakh tonnes of Aman were produced from 56.1 lakh hectares of land last year. A senior DAE official told New Age on Monday that as of November 25 about 36 per cent of Aman had already been harvested and that production would likely be higher than last year. Aman cultivation ended in July-August and its harvest would begin in November-December. When contacted, Food Department director general Ahmed Hossain Khan told New Age on Monday the government would soon fix the purchase rate of Aman after estimating the production cost and market price.