The monsoon’s revival in most of the Tarai districts last week, after a month-long drought during the key paddy transplantation period, has generated optimism among farmers about this year’s harvest.
The monsoon’s revival in most of the Tarai districts last week, after a month-long drought during the key paddy transplantation period, has generated optimism among farmers about this year’s harvest. Things looked really bad a fortnight ago, but the scenario has changed with most of the drought-affected districts getting drenched by heavy rains last week.
The Ministry of Agricultural Development has also revised its paddy transplantation estimate with the arrival of heavy rains in the eastern and central Tarai. “Earlier, we had estimated that paddy transplantation would reach below 90 percent on the 1.60 million hectares of rice fields this year. But the late arrival of the monsoon has changed the calculation,” said Shankar Sapkota, assistant spokesperson of the ministry. “We have expected that the transplantation rate will now touch 95 percent.”
“Technically, the paddy transplantation period in the Tarai ends in mid-August, but in some cases, paddy can be planted till early September. The rains have come as a relief,” said Sapkota, adding that the output, however, would decline as the late transplantation would reduce the ripening time and harvests. He added that plants would not get enough solar intensity if the ripening period were to stretch into the winter.
Agro experts said that a majority of farmers sow paddy seeds directly on their fields rather than growing seedlings as they don’t have enough time. Normally, drought tolerant rice varieties like Sukha Dhan are applied if the normal transplantation period exceeds as they can recover at a faster rate and have a lower ripening time.
Two weeks ago, the government had projected a loss of Rs25 billion in paddy output this year amid droughts in the eight Tarai districts in the eastern and central regions. “However, the projected losses will not reach that level,” Sapkota said.
The eight districts-Saptari, Siraha, Dhanusha, Mahottari, Sarlahi, Rautahat, Bara and Parsa-have been hit hard by late and insufficient rainfall this year, with the average paddy transplantation rate reaching just 40 percent in the combined 326,501 hectares of land two weeks ago.
As of August 24, Saptari had observed paddy transplantation on 47 percent of its 70,000 hectares, while in Siraha it had reached 40.6 percent on its 60,757 hectares of paddy fields.
Dhanusha district in the central Tarai region has the lowest rate of 30 percent. Paddy is cultivated on 40,635 hectares in Dhanusha. In Mahottari and Sarlahi, transplantation has reached 48 percent of 36,144 hectares and 58 percent of 45,550 hectares respectively.
Sapkota, who is also a senior agro economist, said that the ministry had released funds to install 500 shallow tube wells in the eastern and central Tarai regions to prevent further paddy crop damage if droughts occur during the weeding period.
“Most of the farmers have installed shallow tube wells, while others are in the process of doing so.” He said that the ministry had requested additional funds from the Finance Ministry to distribute more shallow tube wells in the affected areas.
The ministry’s statistics showed that as of August 24, the national average paddy transplantation rate had reached 83.14 percent of the total land available. Belt-wise, the transplantation has been completed on 90 percent of 68,364 hectares in the mountain region. Likewise, in the hilly region, the transplantation has been completed on 91 percent of 423,173 hectares. The transplantation in these two belts normally ends in the first week of August.
The ministry said that the transplantation in the Tarai belt, the country’s food basket, had been completed on 79.66 percent of the total 1.11 million hectares of paddy fields.
The ministry has also decided to expedite its “system of rice intensification” and “direct seedling rice” system in the affected districts. “We have also planned to distribute subsidized vegetable seeds to farmers who have not been able to plant paddy,” Sapkota said.
The country produced paddy worth Rs100 billion in the fiscal year 2014-15. The paddy output dropped 5.1 percent to 4.78 million tonnes last year due to a late monsoon and untimely rainfall. The ministry had estimated a loss of Rs5 billion last year.
Agro experts said the economic outlook for the next year is bleaker amid weak monsoon forecasts. Agriculture, the major contributor to Nepal’s economy, is mainly rain-fed. In 2011-12, paddy production rose an impressive 13.7 percent, and as a result, the farm sector’s growth rate swelled to 4.63 percent.
However, in 2012-13, paddy output dropped 11.3 percent and the economic growth rate slumped to a six-year low of 3.5 percent. Nepal’s economy inched up just 3 percent in the last fiscal year due to the April 25 earthquake and a drop in paddy production.
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