Who we are
Seven researchers.
One conviction.
Agro-Feme Septet began not as a project but as a question — and the stubbornness to pursue it through five planting seasons, two international awards, and one government framework.
Our mission
To demonstrate, at scale, that nature-based food systems managed by women outperform extractive agriculture on every metric that matters — yield, soil health, household income, and ecological resilience.
We are a septet — seven researchers at different career stages, with complementary expertise in soil science, fisheries management, agricultural economics, gender studies, and community development.
We operate out of Bangladesh Agricultural University but our work belongs to the communities that host it. Our lab is a field. Our peer reviewers include the farmers who told us when we got it wrong.
What guides us
Our values
- Women at the centre
- Every research decision — from hypothesis to dissemination — is led by or co-designed with women. Participation is not optics; it is methodology.
- Nature-based, not nature-adjacent
- We reject interventions that merely reduce chemical load. Our benchmark is ecosystem restoration: soil biota, water retention, biodiversity indices.
- Community before journal
- Findings go back to farming households in plain language before they go to academic reviewers. Communities are co-authors of the knowledge, not subjects.
- Rigour without extractivism
- We publish open access, share raw datasets, and train local enumerators to own the data long after we leave. Research relationships do not end at harvest.
How we got here
Timeline
Founded at BAU
Seven undergraduate researchers form an informal study group at Bangladesh Agricultural University, Mymensingh, unified by a single question: can ecological interventions outperform chemical inputs for smallholder food security?
First field trials
Twelve farming households in Tangail agree to participatory research. SRI rice trials and integrated pest management plots run alongside control fields. First season data is collected entirely by women enumerators.
Peer-reviewed publication
Findings from the first crop cycle published in the Journal of Agricultural Science, Bangladesh. The paper becomes one of the most downloaded articles from a Bangladeshi university that year.
Green Future Prize
BRAC and UN Environment Programme award Agro-Feme Septet the Youth Category prize. Funding enables scaling to 35 households and hiring three community liaisons.
National & international recognition
Two awards in one year: Bangladesh Academy of Sciences Best Innovation in Sustainable Agriculture, and the FAO Regional Women in Agriculture Award for South Asia.
Policy integration
Research findings cited in the Bangladesh National Agro-Ecological Transition Framework. The team now advises the Ministry of Agriculture on women-led extension programming.