Selim Uddin, 50, had been a farmer all his life like his father and his father before him. Until a few years ago, he earned his living by farming on a small piece of land and fishing in canals in and around his South Madrasa union in Chittagong's Hathazari upazila.

It takes 14 million litres of irrigation water to produce six tonnes of Boro rice on one hectare of typical farmland in Bangladesh.