Writer: Suman Tamang
Lalitpur metropolitan city, popularly known as Patan is currently one of the most vibrant cities of Nepal. It is located in about 5 km south-east of Kathmandu. With its urban history dating back to as far as 2300 years, LMC is one of the three major cities located inside Kathmadu valley, besides Kathmandu and Bhaktapur. The altitude ranges from 300-3000m occupying the area of 385km². it has humid sub-tropical climate. It occupies more rural areas than urban where agriculture is main occupation of people. Brahman, chhetri, Tamang and Newar etc, are the main caste living here with their own culture and religions like Buddhist, Hindus, etc.
Major cereal crops grown here are rice, maize and wheat and Various cole crops like cabbage, cauliflower, etc are grown by most of the people. Seasonal as well as off-seasonal vegetables are grown here in order to fulfill the market demand. Lalitpur is the second district followed by Kavre in dairy production. People mostly raise buffalos, cattle, goats, etc. buffalos mainly for milk production. Some people are also involved in fish farming. Ranbow Traut fish farm at Thosnekhola ,Godawari, etc are some examples. Similarly Chandanpur, Naman, Batase, etc are famous places for the production of Ginger, cardamom ,coffee, etc. According to “commercial coffee farming survey 2017-18”, published by CBS commercial coffee farming is being practiced in 32 districts, among which syanja, kavre and Lalitpur are leading districts. In Lalitpur about 96.3 hectares land has been utilized for coffee farming. There are total 528 coffee farms. Agri-products are well marketed and most of them go to Kathmandu which also minimizes the chance of post-harvest loss for fresh fruits and vegetables. In order to fulfill the demand of skill manpower by providing practical and technical education, Valley Agriculture Campus located at Godawari Municipality-11, Chapagaon has been established under the affiliation of Agriculture And Forestry University (AFU) Rampur Chitwan. Only few people are engaged in business and trade. most of the people depend on agriculture for income generation.
subsistence agriculture is dominant over commercial agriculture. There is no Mechanization and diversification in agriculture. most of the young people to whom we consider the backbone of nation are going to foreign country for employment. The agriculture fields are left fallow. .There is no government loan and subsidy for the farmers. Farmers are not adopting the modern technologies in farming due to the lack of technical knowledge. NAARC is not able to address the farmers actual problems regarding the new breeds of crop and livestock disseminated by it to the farmers. This is mainly due to the lack of coordination between research station (NAARC), extension body (DOA) and educational bodies (IAAS,AFU,etc).similarly, during monsoon newly constructed rural roads are being heavily damaged and creates obstacle for commodity transportation. Due to which farmers are compelled to throw away large products.
Despite above mentioned problems, there is wide scope and possibility that agriculture can be brought in front line in the development of Lalitpur district. Around 10 lakh population reside in Kathmandu valley whose daily food demand is fulfilled mainly from Chitwan and from the import of India. So, government from central, provincial and local level should emphasize on productivity increase through policy making and their implementation. Citizen who have learned skill in agriculture and returned from foreign should be encouraged to involve in agriculture by providing loan, subsidy. Trend of brain drain of agriculture students should be avoided making proper policy and providing attractive job. Strong policy should be made and implemented in order to make the effective coordination between research station, extension agency and educational institute. One of the major and surface seen problem in agri-business is involvement of any person as a middleman in marketing system. Farmers even don’t get half of the actual price of their products. Due to which farmers to whom we consider the God to safe from starvation are known as the slave of middleman.so only those who have got legalized authority from government should be involved as middle agent. If these things are done then Nepal government slogan-“prosperous Nepal, happy Nepali” may change in reality.
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