COVID-19 prohibitory measures causes huge loss for Bhaktapur Vegetable farmers

Bhaktapur / June 21 : Vegetable farmers of Bhaktapur had to bear a huge loss this season as they were incapable of supplying produces to the market due to a prohibitory order implemented by the government against COVID-19. Different verities of vegetables like cauliflower, cabbage went rotten in the farm.

The farmers have to feed the produces to cows and buffaloes as they are not able to sell them. They had to till the land for paddy cultivation without clearing it of remains. Roshan Giri of Changunarayan municipality-9 Tathali said that the cauliflower and cabbage he grew on five ropani of land was rotten in the field.

He said that he had to endure this kind of loss last year too. In the one hand the Bhaktapur farmers could not visit the market to sell their produces due to the prohibitory measures while on the other hand their regular clients (vegetable suppliers) refused to make dealings with them citing the produces had no market during the crisis.

Giri alone incurred a loss of Rs 300 thousand this time from the vegetable farming and the loss is more by Rs 100 thousand than of the last year,

Samita Giri has a similar story to share. She is doing vegetable farming on a leased land, but the business went to a total loss and she is even finding it hard to pay the land rent.

Rajuram Karki of Chittapole, Surya Binayak Municipality-10 has a similar complaint. As he said, he suffered Rs 300 thousand losses last year and this year the loss was Rs 400 thousand.

Farmers of Bhaktapur Municipality, Sipadole, Nakhel and Chittapol of Suryabinyaak and Tathali, Sudal and Bageshwori of Changunarayan were hit hard by the COVID-19 prohibitory measure. They expect to get some relief for their loss from the local governments. RSS