Two years ago the government had unveiled a 10-year project to boost paddy production by covering 1,200 hectare land

Jhapa, July 25

Even though Jhapa has been declared a ‘super zone’ for paddy production, farmers still have to wait for rainfall to plant paddy, as they lack a proper irrigation facility.

Kechana, Prithvinagar, Baniyani, Pathamari, Balubadi and Pathariya are among places in Jhapa that have been declared super zone for paddy production but farmers in these places are suffering due to lack of proper irrigation facility. “We waited for the rain but as it was not enough we have now started planting paddy by pumping groundwater,” said Shankar Dulal of Kechana.

The government has installed 40 boring machines, including a solar motor to pump underground water for irrigation, but it’s still not enough for farmers during the paddy plantation season. The government project has distributed 40 electricity-operated motors to farmers, while the solar-driven water pump was installed at a cost of Rs 1.5 million.

Another farmer Krishna Khanal lamented that motors distributed to farmers by the government were not enough. “The motors were distributed only to those who had connections or were related to the distributors, not to poor people like us,” she observed.

Two years ago, the government had unveiled a 10-year project to boost paddy production by covering 1,200 hectare land in this region. The project was implemented to provide the necessary facilities to farmers so that they could boost paddy production using modern technologies.

Prime Minister Agriculture Industrial Zone Paddy Super Zone Operator’s Committee Chair Nawaraj Bhattarai, on his part, called on the government to do more to make the project effective. “It has emerged now that the government should also manage electricity for farmers, as it is very necessary for irrigation, only then can production be boosted,” he said.

Further, he also called for an end to the recent trend of traders’ domination in fixing the price of paddy. “As we don’t have any provision for store the paddy produced by farmers, it’s the traders who determine the price of paddy. The price they fix is not at all reasonable,” said Bhattarai. As per the project, Rs 7 million was provided as grant to farmers in the super zone in the last fiscal.

This fiscal, the Irrigation Development Division Office, Jhapa, has allocated Rs 39.1 million for the paddy super zone.