Recent News and Events
Published By: Admin on: 2012-05-29
Man Bahadur Bista of Patmara VDC in Jumla vividly recalls a time long ago when he was be compelled to trash a substantial portion of his farmed apples because of the lack of transportation facilities in the district. Bista would usually give most of it away for free to his fellow villagers, or even feed the apples to his livestock if production was particularly high. It was, he says, absolutely heartbreaking to see his year-long efforts go to waste this way, season after season.
The construction of the Karnali Highway, however, has completely changed things for Bista and other apple farmers in the region today, providing easier access to traders and ensuring that every bit of the harvest is sold. Apples that would’ve otherwise been distributed for free, or tossed in the garbage to rot, are fetching as much as Rs 30 per kg in the market at present thanks to improved transportation. This means apple farmers from the area who once made meagre earnings have seen their annual incomes take a huge leap to around Rs 300,000. “Everything has changed,” says Bista. “Not only are we getting better prices for our produce, but we also get subsidies from the government now.”
Bista explains that these favourable market conditions and the support of the government have convinced many people in the district to take up apple farming. What used to be a volatile choice of livelihood is today a rather assured means of sustaining an income and making profits.
Testament to the blossoming of the apple business in Jumla is the fact that farmers here have been using up more than 200,000 new apple saplings annually. According to the District Agriculture Development (DAD) office in Jumla, the district sold around 2,300 tonnes of apples last year—a good yield considering there had been heavy snowfall to contend with, curtailing production somewhat. But given good climate predictions for this year, the DAD estimates that harvest will amount to around 60 metric tonnes.
“The potential is huge,” says one of the district’s senior agricultural officers, Aaita Bahadur Gurung. “Rudimentary studies show that Jumla has the capacity to produce at least 50 times more than its current output if all the available land in the 30 VDCs here were to be put towards apple farming, which is what we’re hoping to achieve eventually.” With this objective of pushing Jumla’s apples higher up in a market dominated by Indian and Chinese varieties in mind, the DAD has recently launched the One House One Apple Farm campaign in all of the district’s VDCs. The government’s High Value Agriculture Programme (HVAP) in hilly and mountainous areas has also provided significant support in this regard.
One of the biggest selling points of the Jumli apple is the fact that it is grown organically, a feature that boosts its popularity in cities like Kathmandu and Pokhara among others. Stakeholders in the district are therefore intent on maintaining the organic identity and strictly forbidding the use of chemical fertilisers. “This is one aspect that sets us apart from the Chinese and Indian produce,” says another senior agricultural officer, Hari Prasad Gurung. “Consumers are willing to pay up to Rs 200 per kg for our apples if they know they have been organically produced, and giving up that kind of reputation just for convenience’s sake would be a mistake.”
Fertilisers, however, pose a problem for farmers, where the difficulty in procuring organic fertilisers is hampering the smooth progress of their work. They are insistent that if Jumli apple farms are to be kept organic, the government should take up the issue and provide organic fertilisers at cheap rates—if not, foreign-imported brands will quickly surpass local apple sales.
Former Chairman of the Federation of Nepalese Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Jumla and a farmer himself, Sarpananda Hamal thinks that despite some obvious obstacles, there has been significant improvement in the overall quality and quantity of apple recently. This is probably, Hamal says, a result of the HVAP and the technical skills it has imparted to farmers through trainings in terms of nurturing, picking and pack-aging plants. Besides disseminating saplings and other forms of assistance, the project has made remarkable contributions to the use of modern equipment and development of farming techniques in apple production.
Another encouraging sign is that local businessmen aren’t entirely dependent on the outside market anymore, having found uses for their apples themselves. Many, for instance, are involved in producing apple-derived items including wine, juice, jam and dried apple in the district.
Farmers in Jumla, who were cut off and largely neglected by the outside world for many, many years are finally coming into their own. Their commitment and hard work in expanding and streamlining the apple business have been inspiring. According to Aaita Gurung, if production proceeds in the same way for the next 10 years, the district could very well become capable of meeting all of the demands of the Nepali market that is currently being fulfilled through imports costing billions of rupees.
“If things go as planned, Jumli apples alone could feed Nepali consumers eventually,” says Gurung.
As reported by Roshan Sedhai in The Kathmandu Post. Click here to read the original article.