Kathmandu, September 19

With the biggest festival just around the corner, Nepal Food Corporation (NFC) is gearing up to fix the price of goats for Dashain on Wednesday.

NFC Spokesperson Shankar Sapkota informed that NFC is in the last stage of analysing the cost and other factors affecting the price of goats this Dashain. “We will fix the rate by Wednesday evening,” said Sapkota.

Every year during Dashain, NFC sells a certain number of goats at subsidised rate to facilitate festive consumers and fixes the price of goats it sells just a week before Dashain. This year NFC plans to sell almost 2,500 goats during Dashain. By selling goats during Dashain every year, NFC also intends to control overpricing of goats, especially from private goat traders.

As per Sapkota, NFC is likely to fix goat price this year at around Rs 460 per kilogram, Rs 10 more than the rate fixed by NFC for Dashain last year. “The cost price of goats in different domestic sources has increased by Rs 10 per kilogram, which is why the goat price will go up this Dashain compared to last year. However, NFC will determine the actual rate of goats on Wednesday after factoring in the transportation cost, among others,” informed Sapkota.

NFC is purchasing goats for Dashain basically from livestock farmers in districts like Dang, Makawanpur and Siraha and will sell the goats from Fulpati (September 27) at NFC’s office based in Thapathali.

Meanwhile, livestock traders who had sold goats at Rs 470 per kilogram last year have said that they are not in a position to sell goats at less than Rs 500 per kilogram during Dashain this year. “A number of goats were killed in the floods and landslides this year and this will result in short-supply of goats from domestic sources. As road conditions in different parts of the country are not good, this will also affect the transportation cost of imported goats from India,” said Deepak Thapa, president of Nepal Livestock Traders Association (NLTA).

As per traders, more than 80 per cent of the demand of goats during Dashain festival is fulfilled through supply from India. Thapa informed that goat price has surged in the Indian market too.

Traders have anticipated that the demand for goats in Kathmandu Valley would hover around 50,000 during Dashain this year.