Money
Dashain shopping: Thousands flock to livestock markets
Thousands of people have started to flock to livestock markets across the country to buy goats and sheep in readiness for the Dashain sacrifice.Pradeep Menyangbo
Thousands of people have started to flock to livestock markets across the country to buy goats and sheep in readiness for the Dashain sacrifice.
More than 75,000 he-goats, mountain goats and sheep will be brought to the Kathmandu Valley to be slaughtered during the Dashain festival. The Valley is a major consumer of goats and sheeps during the Dashain festival.
A Dharan-based agriculture marketplace has sold goats worth Rs4.5 million within a week. On Friday, the market recorded transactions of Rs30 million alone from the sales of animals. The price of live goat has been fixed at Rs450 per kg this year.
Nepali farmers have been supplying goat to the market. “We have seen sufficient goats supplied from the eastern hill districts this year,” said Laxman Bhattarai, manager of the marketplace. “As Nepali farmers have started to supply sufficient numbers of goats this year, it has reduced imports from India,” he said.
Until last year, the marketplace used to record goat sales worth more than Rs60 million imported from India, he said.
He said that due to increasing population and urbanisation, demand for mutton has been increasing at around 25-30 percent annually. “As demand is likely to soar in the future, goat rearing can become a good source of income if the government encourages farmers with subsidies and other facilities.”
According to Bhattarai, nearly Rs80 million worth of goat meat is sold in Dharan during the Dashain festival.
Goats are normally supplied from eastern hill districts like Khotang, Bhojpur, Terathum and Dhankuta. The farmers from these districts arrive in Dharan three days earlier to sell goats and they stay at lodgings provided by the marketplace.
Farmer Gajendra Rai and trader Manoj Dhakal who came from Arun Rural Municipality of Bhojpur said they brought the goats from the hilly region to the marketplace. “We have been selling goats that grew up in the hilly areas,” Dhakal said.
Many farmers make handsome income from selling goats during the Dashain festival. The income earned allows them to manage festival expenditure, buy necessary groceries and garments by selling the livestock, said a goat farmer.
Meanwhile, the local administration has also levied an export tax on goats. Traders said that there were no such provisions before.
The marketplace in Dharan has requested the authorities concerned not to charge tax while supplying goat from one district to another.
“However, there has been no response from the authorities regarding this matter,” said Parshu Ram Katuwal, chairman of market management committee.